Art of The Short Story by Carl Henry Grabo (c1913)

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THE ART OF THE SHORT STORY
BY
CARL
H.
GRABO
Instructor in English, the University of CbicafO
CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS

NEW YORK
CHICAGO
BOSTON
COFYKIGHT, 1913, BY
CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS

Printed in the United States of America
I
PREFACE
The
have
principles of narrative structure
which I
set
down
here are for the most part true of
the novel as well as of the short story, though for

conciseness
and clearness
chiefly
have discussed
latter.
their
are,
application
to
the
They
commonly enough held, though in my college work I have felt the need of a book which should collect and relate them in simple, The orderly, and yet comprehensive fashion.
most
of them,
material
is
scattered,
it.
and the amateur writer
cannot easily find
For other than commonplace and accepted

principles of structure I
have
relied chiefly
on
Stevenson, whose letters and essays are
filled
with comments of technical interest to writers.

It is unfortunate that he never wrote his promised
work, a "small and arid book" upon the art of

fiction.
is
Most
of
my indebtedness
to Stevenson
specifically
acknowledged in the following

of the
pages.
The method
book
is
in part
based upon
In this
Poe's The Philosophy of Composition.
vi
PREFACE
of
he traces the development
The Raven, making

Unfor-
clear the steps of the creative process.
tunately he did not perform a like office for his

short stories, an analysis which would have been
even more valuable.

material
tion, the
There
is
curiously
little
upon the psychology

is
of story composi-
very thing which the beginner most

too often of the opinion that the
needs, for he
men he
seeks to emulate
esses too mysterious
work by mental procand profound for his under-
standing.
writers
There are invaluable hints if skilled would but give them which might save the beginner much time and mistaken effort and as well inspire him with some small confidence in the methods which he pursues, whatever his despair at the immediate results thereof.
Could I analyze the masterpieces of the short story with certainty and exactness, so that their inception and development might be made clear
and
explicit, I
should rely upon them alone to

possible only to the
illustrate the
mental processes of story writing.
But
so exact
an analysis
is
author.
I have, therefore, in addition to quot-
ing from Stevenson, Poe, and
Henry James,
en-
deavored from
to analyze the
my own experimental
way
in
knowledge
which the mind seeks and then proceeds to and develop it. I trust that what I have found true of my experience may be of some value to others
selects a story idea
PREFACE
who
I
vii
are seeking to learn the difficult art of
working effectively at story composition.
am
greatly indebted to the following
mem-
bers of the English department of the University

of
Chicago for helpful criticism and advice: Mrs.
Flint, Mr. Robert M. Lovett, and Mr. James W. Linn.
Edith Foster
CONTENTS
CBAPISR
I.
PAGE
The Short Story The Essentials of Narrative The Point of View

.
II.
_.
6
21
III.
..._...
rV.
The Unities of
Place
Action, Time, and
-37
. .
V.
VI.
Exposition and Preparation

Introductions. ration
65
The Order of Nar96

115
.
VII.
VIII.
Character-Drawing
Description OF Person AND Place
143
DC.
Dialogue
Types of Story Ideas
Titles and
175
X.
XI.
XII.
XIII.
198
Names
. . ,
214
227
Suggestion and Restraint
Unity of Tone
ix
244
X
CBAPTKR
CONTENTS
PAGX
XIV.
The Psychology of Story Writing

Conclusion
Appendix: Poe's "The Philosophy OF Composition"
265
XV.
284
295
Index
313

CHAPTER
I
THE SHORT STORY

Various attempts have been made
to define
the short story as a distinct form of narrative,
much
verse
as a sonnet
may
be characterized as a
different
form conspicuously
from the
ballad and the ode. But though every one knows in a general way what a short story is, no
single definition as yet devised has
ciently
precise
to
The reasons
technic.
for this
proved suffiwin universal acceptance. failure will be worth noting
at the outset of our discussion of short-story
It is impossible, in the first instance, to state
exactly
what
is
meant by
*'
short."
We have no
In compari-
difficulty in classing the
Odyssey as a long story,
an
epic, or
Vanity Fair as a novel.
son with these, the tales of the Arabian Nights

or the stories of
Maupassant are relatively short. Yet we may not define a ''short story" as a fictitious prose narrative of five, or ten, or fifteen
ART' OF
THE SHORT STORY

case, shall
thcusand woriis, for what, in that

this
say of a story of sixteen thousand words?
we Must
ob-
be called by another name, a "novelette,"
perhaps?
viously unsafe.
To draw so hard and fast a Nor is the difficulty

which
line is
less if
we
define a "short story" as one
may be
The
read
at a sitting, for
'*
we read
at varying speeds,
and a
char-
sitting"
may
be two hours or four.
acteristic, shortness, is
a relative, not a fixed,

defini-
attribute,
and upon
it
we cannot frame a
if
tion of the "short story."
We
encounter equal difficulty
we endeavor
upon some distinctive whereby a "short story" may be differentiated from other types of short narrative, such as the "tale" and the "allegory." Rip Van Winkle is usually classed as a tale. We feel readily that it differs somewhat from the short story as practised by Kipling and Maupassant. Yet there are many points of resemblance, too, and it is almost impossible to construct a brief and intelligible definition which
to base our definition
peculiarity of form
shall
make
the distinction clear.
Literary classi-
fications are not like those of chemical elements,
and sharply drawn. A truer analogy would be that of a gradation of colors. This
distinct
color,
blue.
are
we say, without hesitation, is green; that But not always can we be so sure. There colors which partake of both, and which we
THE SHORT STORY

may
color
call blue-green,
or greenish-blue, or
by a
with
specific
name which more
or less loosely defines a
commingled
of the two.
Thus
it is
the forms of fiction.

tell
It is almost impossible to
at
what point one type
begins,
and another
ends, for they have
many
elements in
common;
the structural principles of one resemble too

closely the structural principles of a seconds
Only when the contrast

tinction easy.
is
extreme
is
a clear
dis-
A more profitable method whereby to approach

the difficulty
novel.
is
to consider the analogy of the
forms of fictitious narrative from which the novel has been developed need
earlier
The
not concern us here.
We
should note merely
that various novelists, each with the work of his

predecessors as a vantage-ground, have developed
the possibilities of the novel as a form of prose

fiction;
its field
have improved
so that at last
is.
its
technic
and defined
failures,
we have a
clear
fairly clear idea
of
what a novel
Experiments,
and
half -successes
have made
what the
novelist
may and may
not attempt with a reasonable
prospect of success.
Of shorter fictitious narratives much the same is true. Only by repeated experiment have certain of the possibilities of the form been revealed
as yet not
all of
them, we
may
well believe.
And, while the
potentialities of the
form have
ART OF THE SHORT STORY

so, too,
been indicated,
have been
its limitations.
Nowadays
the skilled writer decides, before set-
ting pen to paper, at what length and in what form he may best express his idea, for he knows that some of the resources of the novel are denied
the short story;
and, conversely, that an idea
effectively clothed in the shorter

suffice for
form
may
not
the more elaborate development de-
manded
in the novel.
stories the difference
Between novels and short

in technic
is,
at bottom, dependent almost solely

of the narrative.
upon the length

sand words I
In two thou-
shall not, obviously,
be able to do
what George Eliot, in Middlemarchy has done in two hundred thousand. I should be foolish to try. But what is true of stories so discrepant in length as two thousand and two hundred thousand words is true in lesser degree of stories two and five thousand words long, though both may,
in the
common acceptation of the term, be "short

That there
are structural principles
stories."
true of one form of fiction
and not
of another
we
may
not safely declare.
Certain principles true

short, there are,
of all narratives, long
and
and
at these
we can
arrive.
We may
also recognize
structural difficulties which bear with increasing
weight upon the writer as he attempts an ever

shorter form.
But we
are wise
if
we do not make
our theories too
inelastic.
THE SHORT STORY

The study
is
of the technic of the short story

critical analysis of ex-
nothing more than the
periments
made in
will
the shorter forms of narrative.
From
tions
this analysis
emerges a body of generaliza-
which
guide the writer in the effective

his idea
development of
sible to
that
may
is,
a technic.
At
the end of our study
it
perhaps be pos-
summarize
results in a fashion sufficiently
concise to serve as a definition of the short-story
but to attempt such definition at the outset would be unprofitable. We need first to under^
jrbrm,
stand the narrative principles true of

long and short.
all storieSj^
Then we may
consider
more
minutely those structural principles which are

increasingly significant as the story form be-
comes
shorter.
y^X<^^^"^'^-
'
K^J^
CHAPTER n
THE ESSENTIALS OF NARRATIVÊ

There
true of
are, then, certain structural principles
all stories, alike
short and long.
These
we should understand
more
before
we
seek to define
particularly the essentials of short fiction.

first
We
should learn
that
what a story
is;
and
this
demands
tive, for
we
is
explain the meaning of narra-
a story
only fictitious narrative, narra-
tive imaginatively constructed to produce a de-
sired effect.
Narrative
in
we may
loosely define as a recor d.
ords, of experience.
Thus
history and bi-
ography are narratives no less than the stories The term is broad and inclusive. Let of Poe.
us trace the steps by which
we may develop one
of the simpler narrative forms, the autobiog-
raphy.
Th_i:ibig_ct of
an autobiography
significant
is jto_
re cord
înteresting
and
experiences.
This
purpose
is,
in reality, twofold.
The
incidents of
his life being of interest to the writer,

first of all, interest
they may,
you
as well, for through the

6
ESSENTIALS OF NARRATIVE
imagination you are able to re-create,
to
less vividly
be sure, the accidents which have befallen him. These experiences have, however, been
more than interesting of themselves; they have and moulded him, made him what he is. You, following them, become, in some sort, acaffected
quainted with his personality.
He is,
in a sense,
the hero of a true story, and you trace his for-
tunes with some degree of concern.
But how
does he select from his many experiences those which are interesting and important only, for he cannot tell everything he does and feels. Even
Boswell's Life of Dr. Johnson^ long as
to
it is, fails
record
everything Johnson did and said.

all;
Johnson himself could not have told it he would have forgotten.
much
of
Memory
it is
that
first sifts
our experiences.
which each night he Were" one to keep a diary put down the events of the day, memory would
He see to it that his journal was not too full. would not remember a tenth of his sensations. Many of them would be so familiar or so trivial Yet there would be many as to pass unheeded. left, the record of which would serve as the story of the day. Each day he would accumulate more, and in the course of years an immense
quantity.
So vast would the collection become

that, for the sake of his read-
that with his future autobiography in mind, he
would soon reaHze
8
ers,

a discriminating selection was imperative.
therefore,
Deliberately,
diary, to cull
teresting,
he would reread his
from
it
only the best
the most
is
in-
and the most
significant.
As he rereads
his diary the writer
immeof
diately struck with an important fact:
many
the incidents there narrated are highly uninter-
him now, though indubitably he once thought them of importance. They neither possess any enduring quality of interest, nor are they of any significance in the light of after events. They resemble, indeed, many passages
esting to in the diary of the garrulous Pepys:
they are
but evidence of the petty concerns with which, for the most part, our lives have to do.
surprised, on the other hand, to note but mention of an incident which he now thinks vastly more important than many another told at greater length. Wherein does his later judgbrief
He is
ment
here:
differ
from the former?
The
difference lies
is
the incident, unimportant at the time,
truly significant
by reason
of its relation to sub-
sequent incidents of importance.
It
may have
been the introduction to a stranger who is now an intimate friend; to an enemy who has since
injured him;
to the girl
who
is
now
its
his wife.
He did not know the potentialities of the incident

at the time.
nificance.
Now
he perceives
vast sig-
there
As he turns the pages he may chance here and upon entries which hnk themselves together On this day he met again the woman in chains. who is his wife. He was impressed by her
beauty or her inteUigence.
Again, he called
trace the growth of
upon
his
her, or
they met at the house of a friend.
From week
to
week he can
romance.
He
is
struck
by
the fact that
it
constitutes a story, one of the
many
stories,
broken or complete, which make up the sum of

his
life.
have employed the term ''story" as one apis
pro priate to such a chain of related incident s as
I-have out lined. What, then,

ing char acter of a story?
lefûs take for analysi s
the distinguishits essentials,
To
grasp
some
st ory
which has
bee n universally
which, therefore,
artistic.
I shall
for a long time, and presumably good, that is, briefly summarize the chief inis
known
cidents of Cinderella.
Cinderella
is
the
beautiful
and
virtuous
daughter of a widower
loneliness
who
seeks to forget his
by marrying a widow. The widow's two daughters, less beautiful and good than Cinderella, are jealous of her and abuse her. The stepmother, also, because of them, is hard upon the girl, and makes her the household
drudge.
Cinderella's lot
is
a sad one,
for,
while
her stepsisters are enjoying themselves at balls,
lo

is
she
without fine clothes, and pleasures, and

to give
attention.
It
happens that the king of the land

all
is
a great ball to which

prince,
his son,
will
the young ladies of
position are invited, for from
among them
is
the
make
choice of a bride.
Cinderella would like to go, but she
without
the fine clothes necessary.

ball she
On
the night of the

fate.
remains at home and bewails her
As she
is
thus sorrowful, her fairy godmother ap-
pears, inquires the cause of Cinderella's grief,
and comforts her by transforming her rags to a beautiful ball-dress and her worn shoes to crystal slippers. She also provides a coach and four in which Cinderella may attend the ball, warning her, however, to leave the ballroom
before the last stroke of midnight, since the
charm has potency no
further.
Promising to
heed the warning, Cinderella departs, attracts

the attention of the prince, and dances with him
throughout
the
evening.
At
the
stroke
of
twelve she recalls the fairy's warning, and escapes hastily, in her flight leaving behind one of
the crystal slippers, which the prince finds and
keeps.
Cinderella, arriving
home
in rags, there
ball.
awaits her sisters and their account of the
The prince, the next day, begins his search for the maid of the crystal slipper, whom he has vowed to marry. The couriers who endeavor
to find her to the
ii
whom
the slipper
fits
come
is
at last
home
of Cinderella.
After her sisters try

called
easily,
the slipper unsuccessfully, Cinderella
from the kitchen.
The
slipper goes
on
and as her sisters stare, incredulous, the fairy godmother appears and transforms Cinderella's Cinderrags to rich and appropriate garments. ella marries the prince and forgives her cruel
sisters.
In this outline of incidents there are several

salient characteristics.
It differs
from a biog-
raphy
of Cinderella,
first,
in that it is far less
ambitious.
Of the
many
things which might be
told of the heroine only a few

for the story.
have been selected

firs t
Sel ection of incident is the
characteristic.
But
in a biography there was,
we
found, selection of a sort.

the purpose
is
The
difference
Hes in this:
cases.
unHke
in the
two
Were
I to write a life of Cinderella, I
should select the incidents which best revealed

the varied aspects of her character.
of the crystal slipper
In the story
not only
is
the purpose less
ambitious, but
it is
also different in kind.
We
are interested in Cinderella's character only incidentally.
Our
true interest
is
in the solution
of^her diffi culties.
We
is
wisti to
know what
the
end
of the narrative is to be,
and look forward

important
differ-
to it eagerly.
This
the
first
ence to note in our comparison of biography or
12
autobiography and a story. In the one our sole concern is with the revelation of character. In the other we are concerned only incidentally with
the character and
acter
much with the fate of

call
the char-
that
is,
the outcome of the compHcation

the story.
of events
which we
Because the
author's purpose differs in the two cases, his

selection of incident for the
accomplishment of
concerned with the
before he puts peji
that purpose differs also.
In the story the author
is
/ôutcome, and has
it
in
mind
"^^S^ to paper; it follows that, if he is skilful, he will ^^^ include only such incidents as advance the story
J
K
to that end.
So, in Cinderella^
we
learned noth-
ing of the heroine's girlhood, or of any traits of

character other than those necessary to
make
the story intelligible and interesting.
In a biog-
raphy of Cinderella we should ask

is
far
more than
her as
the
girls in
given here.
We
should ask to
know
an individual
world.
different
from
all
other
As
it is,
she
is
conventional, possessed
only of beauty, virtue, and patience under affliction.
Not only would

detail to the story
the addition of any further
every incident as told
be superfluous, but conversely, may be proved vital to
the intelligibility of the action.
None may be
is,
omitted without making the progress of the

story to
its
objective point
that
the happi-
ness of Cinderella
13
to
some
degree,
Were we,
for
and her marriage to the prince however slight, obscure. instance, to omit all mention of
Possession of the
the loss of the slipper, the whole conclusion of the story would be distorted.
slipper is essential to the prince's search.
We
may
set it
stories
axiom that in the best can be omitted without marno incident

as an
is
down
ring the even progress of the story to its goal.
The
fact that the story of Cinderella
so
memof its
orable that one cannot easily forget

details is sufficient proof
any
that
it
is
well con-
structed, that
it
contains neither too
much nor
too
little
the ideal of selection in story writing.
But the incidents of our story bear not only each one upon the objective point; they have, as well, a relation one to another, so that were we to change their order of recital in any instance, we
should again injure our narrative.
These
inci-
dents are, indeed, virtually but a series of causes
and
effects,
effect in external nature.
and observe the relation of cause and Because of her loneliweeps; because of her
grief,
ness, Cinderella
the
fairy appears
and waves her magic wand; because

end of the
story.
is
of her transformation, Cinderella attends the ball
and
in
so to the
This vital relation of incident to incident
marked contrast to the events of real life, wherein between any two related incidents may
14

in
Dccur a host of unrelated and irrelevant things.
Even
the autobiography previously cited,
only careful selection
made
possible
grouping
of
associated
incidents,
any such and these
groups we found were but a small part of our

Kves, stories
embedded
in
our
life's
experiences.
Fig. I.
Incidents of Biography
graphic illustration
may
serve to
make
clear
this
fundamental difference between a story and

life
the incidents of
as told in a biography.
rela-
"iTThe incidents of the biography have a
tion one to another chiefly as they centre in a
common
tion
is
personality,
the
I.
From
this
they
rela-v
radiate as do the spokes of a wheel.

chronological.
Their
Certain of the incidents]

as, ioxJ
may have
a secondary or story relation,
(example, incidents
2,
15
4,
and
6,
with unrelated
secondary
it
incidents
coming between.
These
groupings are stories in the rough, though
would be well to note that, seeming to lead somewhere, they have usually no clear objective point.
I
>
>
>
>
>
Objective point.
Fig. 2.
Incidents of a Story
JP
The
incidents of a story, on the other hand,
are like the links of a chain:
incident
is
the
2, which in turn causes 3, and march resolutely to a definite and predetermined end. They are selected for this specific purpose. Whereas in a biography the relation of incidents was chronological only, here it is both chronological and logical. The observing will have noted a seeming
cause of incident
all
contradiction to the statement that
all
the in-
cidents of Cinderella carried the heroine on to
marriage and happiness.
Some
of the incidents
seem indeed
hostile to that end.
There
is
that
almost fatal forgetfulness of the

ing on the slipper.
in sight,
fairy
god-
mother's warning, and, again, the delay in try-
We
had thought the goal

happiness,
and the
girl in full sail for
when
these misfortunes gave us a
momentary
the while a
qualm, a qualm only, for
we had
all
i6

conviction
It
that she would pull was as though the author had deliberately set up difficulties for the fun of harrowing our emotions. That it is he has done, and he has had a legitimate purpose in so
deep-seated
through.
doing.
Were
when
Cinderella's path too
smooth we should
not be so interested in her fate as

it is
bestrewn with obstacles.
we now are At the outsym-
set the author has cunningly enHsted our
pathies in her behalf
by
picturing her as beauty
and virtue
in distress.
He
has intimated a pos-
sible amelioration of her lot,
played with
tions
us,
and then he has worked on our susceptible emothat he will not relieve her
by pretending
all.
situation after
But
in so doing
he has inter-
ested
well
and pleased us his object all along. He knows that the very suspense and imceris
tainty he has aroused
a pleasurable emotion,
one which can scarcely be too intense.

consider
it.
We read
the story to experience that emotion and should
him a poor author if he failed to arouse Yet though he has done all this, he has in
no place departed from the logic of his story. The forgotten warning and the loss of the slipper, which seemed for the moment fatal, turn out to be the very means by which the prince is enabled to rediscover Cinderella and claim her. Thus
the writer has secured his suspense legitimately
and
logically.
17
In no case does he violate the
rules of the
It will
game.
be noted that the uncertainty created
by the
pull of seemingly hostile incidents carried
the story to a pitch of interest, after which the
and then set an unmistakable conclusion. At this point, confident of the outcome, we relaxed somewhat, though still curious to know the final
contest wavered for an instant,
definitely to
incidents.
Were
the author too slow in con-
cluding the story
we might become
bored.
The incidents which
align themselves as favor-
able and hostile to the outcome of the story have been called the positive and the negativ e forces. All, it m ust be remembered do really a dvance the story, but some seem not to do so. <rhose which openly help it to its goal are the
,
positive forces;
those which seem to retard
it is
are termed the negative forces.
The
contest
usually thought of as an
up ward
is
slope or climax,
tn e crest of whic h^ is the turning-point.
Beyond
the turning-point, or crest,

at the
a sharp descent,
bottom
of
is
which
lies
the conclusion.
Not always
derella.
the pull of forces which creates
and holds interest so easy of analysis as in CinExamine, for instance, Poe's famous story. The Cask of Amontillado. The motive of the narrator-hero of the tale is revenge. Nothing in any way hinders him in the accompHsh-
i8

of
his
ment
purpose.
The victim
to
is
easily
trapped,
and goes unwittingly
his
doom.
What, we may
ating?
ask, are the negative or retarding
ibrces in a course of action so direct
and undeviIncident
The answer
is
not
difficult.
after incident of increasing
grewsomeness flatters
the reader to anguished curiosity.

rible
Some
hor-
culminating catastrophe there must be,

is
on the rack until the solution delays which whet and sustain curiosity, the record of trivial but significant incidents, serve to create suspense. The emois disclosed.
and the mind
The
tion here
is
not concerned with the fate of the

for that is certain.
doomed man,
is solely
with the manner of his end.
Our interest The emo-
tion,
though far more intense than that we exis
perienced in Cinderella,
much the same in kind.

different fash-
Suspense
It
is
created in a
somewhat
ion, that is all.
may
be objected that not
all stories illus-
trate so obviously as those

conflict of forces.
we have
selected
at times,
sluggish,
The negative incidents may, be few and weak, and the flow of action inadequate to arouse in the reader any
type
great curiosity as to the story's outcome.

stories of this
we
shall later find
In compen-
sating qualities of characterization or intellectual
content.
It will suffice at this point to indicate
the general need in story-construction of well-
balanced and strongly opposed forces.
19
This
need
is
greatest in those stories in which the

is
reader's interest
incident.
with the action, the play of
In a tale of adventure we should be
bored were the hero too seldom in hazardous
and uncertain situations. Again and again the amateur writer will be forced to a reconsideration of these fundamental
principles
of
story construction.
Particularly
must he come
to a realization of the essential

If
logic of narrative.
any incident
of his story
se-
may
go.
be omitted without breaking the vital

effect,
quence of cause and

If
that incident
its
must
any incident is without cause, that cause must be suppHed. the difference between fiction and
rational
Herein Hes
life.
In
life
we are plunged into a welter of experiences, many without relation one to another. We suffer what we call accidents, things unpredictable. In a story we must have no accidents
.i
2r__happenings unpre pared for.

.
is
anticipated
by
its
Every incident stated cause if we have but

is
eyes to see.*
logical; it
is,
Li fe, in a storv,
in short, art
.
rationalize d,
tion
do not know how to bring home more emphatically. Perhaps

it
this distincit
may be
it is
well to put
* See
in other terms.
In a story
Chapter V, " Exposition and Preparation," for a
further discussion of this point.
20
of
no importance that the incidents did or did Thby must seem true, be rational, logical. One m^y take up a newspaper any day and find in it true stories which are incredible. With these the storynot happen to a real person.
writer has nothing to do.
Young
writers find
difficulty in grasping this vital distinction.
"A
true story," they remark parenthetical^, and from the phrase the experienced reader anticipates a shock to his credulity. The ourden
of explanation
force
is
thrown upon that enigmatical

skilled writer takes
life.
The
from
life
his materials,
but these he arranges in a more

life
rational order than
sees
fit
to do.
To
his
problem there must be an answer at which he
may
arrive
by
four.
logical processes of thought, as
does the mathematician.
To him two and two

they sometimes seem
his.
must make
to
If in life
is
make
five,
that
no concern of
CHAPTER in
THE POINT OF VIEW

vl
Thi7 author who has mentally blocked out his

story/ determined definitely
its
objective point,
of the incidents
and selected some, if not which shall comprise the
all,
action, is confronted,
before proceeding farther, with the problem of
phrase?
the p oint of vi ew. Justwhat is meant by the In simple terms we may put the ques-
tion thus:
who
is
to be the supposed narrator
of the story?
We say of a story that it is written

of
from the point
view of a participaiit^j^f an
that
is,
observer, or of the author;
it is
seen
through the eyes of one of these.
We
must
consider the disadvantages and advantages to
the story of one or another of these points of

view.
at
Our range
sight
of selection
is
really wider
possible.
than
first
we
should
deem
The
is
txfig
simplest and most obvious point of view
tha tof the chief pa rticipant.
The
all
story cen-
m him
he was concerned in
the impor-
tant incidents.
ella
Thus we may imagine Cinder-
recounting to her grandchildren the romantic
22

is
tale of her youth, the story of the crystal slipper.
from this point of view that many of the world's famous stories, both long and short, have been written. To mention but a few at random, there are in English such novels, as David Copperfieldf Lorna Doone, Jane Eyre^ Treasure Island,
It
and Robinson Crusoe. stories, such as The Cask

The
Many
of
Poe's short
of Amontillado, already
cited in another connection.
The Black Cat, and

from
this point
Telltale Heart, are written
of view.
fine
modern
illustration
is
(slightly
modified by the author)

Youth.
writer of short fiction one
stories in this
Joseph Conrad's In the work of almost any voluminous
may
find examples of
manner, though some writers have
more predilection for it than have others. Let us see what are its advantages and limitations.
far
Its chief advantage, I think, is that it carries

jÔ
with
it
a certain plausibility.
It resembles in
form, autobiography, and,
if it is
well
managed,
the reader
is
apt to accept the story as true, a

real
life.
John Ridd is as real to me as many a person I have known, for I first read Lorna Doone at an age when one readily surrenders his imagination to an engaging tale. This reahty with which the author has endowed
fragment of
due in considerable part to his choice of the hero as the supposed narrator of events.
his story is
Had
the author told these in his
own
person, the
THE POINT OF VIEW

action
23
would have been at a further remove,

perhaps, less real.
and
so,
Robinson Crusoe approsaic Robinson

is
peals in like fashion.
The
one hard to disbeHeve, despite the surprising

nature of his experiences.
biography.
Almost we forget we are reading a romance, and not a page of autoYet, plausible as
it is,
and frequent as
is
if
is its
employment, the method
fraught with dangers

the hero and
and and
limitations.
The
narrator,
doer of brave deeds, must excite our admiration

respect.
He
for
should not appear unduly
boastful in telHng his
have small use

his
own exploits, or we shall him. On the other hand, if

we must not
deeds are
evil,
as in the case of the narrator-
actor of TIte Cask of Amontillado,
be repelled, but find his personality fascinating, The author's problem is twoif not admirable.
1
fold
to tell the incidents of the story effectively,
i,\
and, as well, so skilfully to delineate the character of the narrator that our interest will
"^
be
held throughout.
There are yet other

narrator can
tell
difficulties.
The
actor-
only those events which can
reasonably come within his experience, or be

told
him by some one
else.
If
the action
is
complicated, trouble will inevitably arise here.
Some event
is
significant in the action of the story
witnessed
by another than the
hero,
and at
24

He
is
some place remote from him.

possibly see
to
it
could not
the reader
intel-
himself.
it,
How,
then,
be informed of
and the story made
ligible?
The
author, to give us the necessary

is
information,
forced to the
employment
of
various devices, such as messengers and letters,
and weakens thereby the vividness
of his story.
More
often he will outrage plausibility, and take
his hero
upon wild and
inexplicable journeys,
simply that the narrator
may
be on the spot
when something important happens.

In Treasure Island, Stevenson at one point
meets the
difficulty
which
his choice of a point

for
of view involves,
by adopting
a time another
point of view altogether.

stolen
Jim Hawkins has away from camp on adventures of his

acquainted.
own.
Meanwhile events happen with which
we must be
To
tell
of these the
author drops the boy hero for a time and gives

us the Doctor's narrative of events in the camp.
Later he returns to the story of Jim Hawkins.

TjigjDoint o f view her^^ ilhictrated, that of a
composite narrîve told by various actors in

the story, will be better appreciated
sider the novels of Richardson.
if
we
con-
Clarissa Ear-
lowe
is
told entirely in
le*^*'*'"
^'"rm.
The
various
actors of the story reveal their experiences

letters to
If
by
one another, some of great length.

all
we may suppose
the characters confirmed
THE POINT OF VIEW

letter-writers,
this
25
there are certain excellences in
method.
ness of detail
Every incident is told with fulby a participant and eye-witness.

is
Moreover, there
be variously
a fine opportunity here to
differentiate character.
This same incident
may
reported
by
several
witnesses,
and
in the discrepancies
may
be laid bare funda-
mental differences of personality.
But
it is
method obviously lacking
in conciseness,
and so
almost certainly unfitted for short narratives.

It is conceivable that a short story
might be
it is
told
by an exchange
stories so written
of letters, and, indeed, a
few
may
be found, but
method unlikely
for reasons
to be often successful, in part
ceed.
which will be apparent as we proMeanwhile we may note that the comthough infrequent,
is
posite narrative,
some-
times employed in the novel.

often resort to
tive,
it.
Detective stories
We
have the hero's narraWilkie Collins em-
the heroine's narrative, that of the butler,
the nurse, and the doctor.
ployed the device frequently, as in the Moon^

stone,
and Stevenson
in
The Master of Ballantrae.
Closely akin to the point of view of the chief

actor or the combined points of view of various
actors
is
that
of
the
minor character who,

This device of
though given a small part in the story, serves

chiefly as
an observer
of events.
story-telling involves, usually,
most
of the de-
26

view previously consid-
fects of the points of
and yet achieves few compensating virtues. The tedious Watson of Conan Doyle's detective He stories is an admirable example of this.
ered,
must be present at all the chief episodes of the story, and what he cannot himself witness he must learn from the hero. He must be suffi-i
ciently
stupid
not to anticipate the correct]
solution of the mystery,
and
his
personality/
must be
tion
so colorless as not to divert our atten-y
from
if
more important
characters.
The
It is
reader tolerates him only of necessity.
doubtful
the stories gain sufficiently in credi-
bility and naturalness to compensate for these That is not to say that this point of defects. view is impossible, for one might readily find Th(; excellent examples of its employment. Little Minister is told from this point of view. Turgenieff resorts to it, and Balzac. But it is at best a leisurely and awkward method of nar-
ration,
its
and the writer should

it
carefully weigh
in
defects before employing
any
instance.
It should be noted that all points of view are
mere devices by virtue

to be.
of
which the story comes
They
are conventions which readers ac-
cept as they do a three-sided

stage.
art
art,
room upon the is any They are limitations upon that possible. but none the less a means to its accomplish-
By
reason of conventions only
THE POINT OF VIEW

merit.
27
it is
No
one
criticises
a picture because
painted with pigments upon canvas rather than
with sunlight upon trees and water.

point of view the author
No more
does the reader criticise the adoption of any
may
choose, provided
that point of view does not obstruct the story.
This would appear self-evident.

apparently,
hesitate to
it is tell
not.
Yet to many, Amateur writers frequently

from the point of it be that I, the
their stories
view of the author.

author,
*'How can
know
all
these things?" they ask.
"I
must
trick
my
me
reader to the belief that some

this,
one has told
that I
am
in possession of
some other's manuscript." The reader goes to no such bother. " Give us the story," says he, *'and with as little delay as possible." For this reason the point of view of the author is usually the most swift and least awkward of all methods of story-telling. Just what is it? In Cinderella some anonymous person in possession of all the facts recounts the tale for the
benefit of the reader.
It is as
though a disemwere an eye-
bodied personality or some one clothed in the
mantle of
invisibility of fairy lore

all
witness to
the important incidents.
The
author can observe happenings at widely remote

points and times as well as here and now.
He
knows what occurs simultaneously at separated

places.
He
is,
in short, omniscient.
28
Complete omniscience includes the ability to and lay bare their secret motives. Novelists whose interest is chiefly character analysis, usually adopt this point of view. Not only do they present their creatures in speech and action, but they reveal also the hidden processes of thought and emosee into the hearts of characters
tion.
The method
is justified
to the reader in
so far as the analysis proves interesting

lightening.
and en-
We make no question of the author's

insight,
assumption of
but we
may
justly criti-
cise the result for its truth to
human
nature as
we know it. The author may, however,
if
he choose, make
no pretension to godlike powers of omniscience. He may, instead, content himself with a record of deed and word by means of which we shaD ourselves come to an understanding of character.
Ostensibly the author
is,
in such a case, scarcely
more than a sensitized recording instrument which turns back the flight of time and reveals
to us the sense-impressions
of
a past scene.
When
is
the author pretends to insight
we say he
omniscient.
When he
Hmits himself to purely
human powers
if
of observation,
though possessed,
need be, of seven-league boots and the power
of invisibility,
we
call
him the author-observant.
These are the two points of view of the author, and before we consider any subtle variants upon
THE POINT OF VIEW

them we should consider the
limitations of each.
possibilities
29
and
The omniscient point

lesser
of
view includes the

is
or merely observant.
It
only sees but explains.
The author not a method well

is
adapted to
stories of psychological interest in
which the dissection

ple,
of
motive
important.
Writers upon ethical problems, such, for examas George Eliot, depend largely
upon
it.
George Meredith and Thomas Hardy, of modern novelists, write usually from this point of view.
But not only must the author analyze effectively, he must also make his characters act and speak
power of interpretation permits him to make speech and action which in themselves seem but colorless and trivial, significant of something more profound. Yet the problem is, nevertheless, considerable. No action or word may be without its reasonable and characteristic implication. If well contrived, the two, action and analysis, are complementary and mutually illuminating, and the
appropriately.
sure, his
To be
reader feels a genuine intimacy of understanding.

Its limitation is that it
demands, usually, rather
more space than the purely objective method of the author-observant, and its passages of analysis may easily become tedious. Many readers prefer speech and action solely, and are content therefrom to draw their own interpretations.
30

To such
readers the observant or objective
method is preferable. The term "objective" means simply that the narrative shall concern
itself solely
with sense-impressions
to sense
'*
word, deed,
which we
This in
indis-
and the various appeals

clude under the term
tinction
description."
from the "subjective" method, which

Objective narrative
is
includes analysis.
anal-
ogous to the drama.

their speech
In a play
we
see a story
acted out by the dramatist's creations.
From
but
also
and action we get not only a story, knowledge of them as persons, and some
suggestion of motive.
do a
difficult thing;
The writer has here to he must make his puppets

.
Everything they say and do must be in character. This implies, really, that he know the motives which prompt them to word and deed. They will not, otherwise, be
reveal themselves.
uniformly consistent and,

it is
so,
convincing.
And
difficult
thing to
make
action and speech
always
significant, for oftentimes
two or more
interpretations are possible unless
we
are very
sure of the actor's intent.

speech,
it is
Also, in
common
author
not easy so to
dififerentiate characters
that they seem individual.
But
this the
must
do, for he has cut himself off from the help
of analysis.
He has so limited himself,

is
of course,
in the belief that the gain

loss; that his story will
greater than the
move
the faster and with
THE POINT OF VIEW

a greater
effect of reality;
31
that the reader
may
not be bored by the author's
own interpretations.
The analogy of this method to that of the drama is further borne out if we consider the
author not only as playwright, but also stage-
manager and audience.

certain accessories
In a play there are

as setting.
known
In a story
the author-observant describes circumstances of place and dress to aid our visualization of the
scene.
Further, he
may
describe the groupings
of his characters, the play of feature, tones of
voice
those things in short which the spectator

by watching
is
at a play gets for himself
the actors-
That the point

is
of
view of the author-observant;
a popular one in modern fiction
apparent
If well handled, it is particularly
adapted, by
It;
reason of
its swiftness,
to the short story.
produces the
of space.
This we
maximum of effect in the minimum may assume without discus-
sion to be a highly desirable characteristic of
short narratives.
We
cannot, however, dismiss the problem of
the point of view without some further comment.
There are variations

already outlined.
of
method within the
field
Suppose, for illustration, that
the writer wishes to be in part, but not wholly,
omniscient; that
is,
he
may
desire to reveal
one
character analytically and
all
others objectively.
this
There
may
be advantages in
method.
The
32

such a case will view the story through
rt;ader in
the eyes of the character so interpreted, gaining
not only the necessary record of story-action, but

in addition
an understanding
of the motives of
will
one of the participants.
He
put himself in
the place of the character analyzed, and experience, vicariously, not only his emotions, but also
his speculations as to the motives
which prompt
other characters in the story to action.

ently this
Appar-
method has
in it something of the
which we noted in the case of participant; but this accompanied by a detachment which makes possible
illusion of reality
the story told
by a
our understanding of the character as the author

sees him.
fine illustration of the
method
is
to be found in the
two novels
is
of
Arnold Bennett,
Clayhanger and Hilda Lessways, in which

the same series of incidents
much
viewed
first
through
the character of the hero, and then through that

of the heroine.
character as though
In each case we look into the we analyzed our own mo-
tives. It is an interesting point of view, and one admirably adapted to much short fiction. Again observe the method of Hawthorne in
The Scarlet
Letter.
The author
is
here omniscient
only at times.
Into some characters he sees
deeply; of others he professes often to be uncertain,
and
is
merely observant.
The reason
for
this self-imposed limitation is that, despite his
THE POINT OF VIEW
33
general desire to dissect character, he wishes to
surround his story with an atmosphere of mystery.

If
he revealed clearly every hidden motive
the result would be too obvious.
but a part and guess the

of the
is
rest.
As it is, we see The chief charm
book
is
that
it
provokes to speculation. It
is,
suggestive:
that
it
induces the reader to
think and collaborate with the author.*
One
further point
and we have done
for the
moment with
the point of view.
Many authors,
omniscient and observant, boldly take the stage
and comment upon their characters, the story, or upon life in general. An author thus obtrusive
we
like in so far as
he entertains or enis
lightens
us.
Thackeray
one of the most
obtrusive authors in English fiction.
Openly
he discusses his ''puppets," or anything the

story suggests, and
many
readers find in this
mannerism one of the chief charms of his books. Jane Austen, on the contrary, remains always
unobtrusively in the background, letting the
story
tell
itself.
There
are
various
middle
grounds.
to
An
omniscient author usually intrudes

his reader's attention,
some degree upon
and
an author-observant
Fielding,
who
in
may do so if he choose. Tom Jones keeps himself well

it
out of the story as
runs, permits himself occa-
sional short interchapters of personal
comment.
* See Chapter XII, " Suggestion and Restraint."

34

may
be omitted
These, he advises the reader,
without detriment to the story.
The modern
self-
tendency
sonally,
is
generally in the direction of
effacement.
The author tells his story imperand if he comments at all upon it does so
remarks of not too individual a tone
in casual
generalizations in keeping with the theme,
and
such as the reader might himself give utterance

to.
There
if
is,
however, no reason at
all
author should refrain from gossip upon his

story
why an own
he
is
certain his readers will enjoy his

is
comment.
titude
It
the uncertainty as to their at-
that deters.
of interest,
The
author's personality
must be
is
to be tolerated.
must enrich his story, if it The modest author, recogniztherefore slow to intrude.
ing the obligation,
is
In conclusion, we
is is
may say
that,
important as
the choice of a point of view in
any
story, it
yet more important that the one selected be
undeviatingly maintained.
of view
is
shift of the
point
certain to
modify the character of the

of
story and to bewilder the reader, as the shift at the end of the third chapter Shop well illustrates. The
The Old Curiosity
skilful writer indi-
cates at the outset the point of view he has

it. A change from the point of view of the author-omniscient
adopted, and never departs from
to that of the actor-narrator would, it
is
obvious,
be bewildering.
The
entire
story
would be
'
THE POINT OF VIEW

changed.
hensible.
35
Less flagrant shifts are equally repre-
The
its
clearness of the story is thereby

effectiveness impaired.
clouded and
The Centre of Interest

Closely related to the problem of the point of
view
is
that of the centre of interest.
story
may
tell
the fortunes of a group of characters,
yet of these but one or two will be of superlative Upon them the author interest and importance.
concentrates his attention.
These it is which the

it is
reader follows with the most concern, and

essential that they
be always dominant.
Other
shift
characters are of importance chiefly as they affect these major characters.
For the writer to
the spot-light of his attention to the lesser characters

is
to invite disaster, for the reader's in-
terest becomes then divided and so weakened. The effect is to make the story's emphasis unif not indeed to make two or more stories what should be but one. The chief characters must hold the centre of the stage from the first, and the story's action should never necessitate their withdrawal from it for any length of time. To them should fall the best lines and the most
certain,
of
interesting experiences.
In a long novel the author may,

divide his attention
related
stories
it is true,
somewhat and drive several four-in-hand as do Dickens,
36

Eliot,
George
and Thackeray.
The
shorter the
story the greater the necessity for concentration, so that in a truly " short" story but one character,
or at the
most two
closely related characters,
should focus our attention.
With every
division
and
dissipation of interest follows

of
effect.
an inevitable
weakening
will
An
examination of the
recognized masterpieces of short-story writing
show
this to
be true.
The point is, however,
one to be considered again in the next chapter,
under the head of unity of action.
We note here
its
the close association of the centre of interest
with the point of view, and at times

ence upon
it.
depend-
Thus,
if
the writer
is
omniscient
in the case of
but one
of his characters,
is
and
If
of
the rest merely observant, he
almost certain
to keep the one constantly before us.
he
is
observant or omniscient of
all,
he
is
sometimes
tempted to side issues which distract his attention from the true centre of interest. Whatever his point of view, he will, if he is wise, select the
central figure of his story
and keep that character
always uppermost in our attention.
CHAPTER IV
THE UNITIES OF ACTION, TIME
AND PLACE
The
and
discussion of narrative principles has
up
to this point been alike applicable to stories long
any incident should be antecedent and convitally related both to sequent. Again there must always be choice of
short.
In
either,
its
a point of view best suited to the character of

the individual story.
But
as
ticularly to the technic of short fiction,
we turn more parwe dis-
cover Hmitations both of subject and method which present problems somewhat different from those of the novelist. These we must now consider.
That the reader

interest with the
shall derive the
minimum
of
maximum of attention we may

The reader
assume to be an
ideal of all writing.
wishes entertainment, identification of himself
mth
but
imaginary characters and their fortunes,

this easily,
without conscious
effort.
The
writer must, therefore, determine
what he may
attempt with reasonable likelihood of success

37
38

is
within the space granted him, and, conversely,
what
certain to be a failure.
highly unprofitable and hazardous theme

is,
for a short story
for example, tê
development
of a character through a considerable period of
time.
Tolstoy's Resurrection and Fielding's
Tom
Jones, utterly different as they are, have this
common
purpose
but
these are long novels.
Perhaps the larger part of character novels are devoted to this problem of development, the
slow modification of a personaHty by the accidents of existence.
requires
To
treat of this effectively
ample room. As the action of time is slow and seldom revolutionary in its immediate effect, so must the writer have space in which to
record with deliberateness the series of incidents
which, singly
trivial, are in
the aggregate of vast
effect; so that, at the
end
of the story
first,
a character
may
be
far other
than at
yet the change be
so gradual as
to
excite not incredulity,
but
acceptance.
In a few thousand words a character cannot be so developed with any degree of convincingness, for the simple reason that there is insuffi-
cient
room
for the necessary detail.
writer seizes instead
The skilful upon some one series of/
incidents which leads to a crisis of character
development.
is
a series of
crises,
Whereas the entire life of a man the theme for a short story is,
THE UNITIES
39
most effectively, but one of these. This may be treated with the fuhless of detail adequate to its delineation were it but one of many in a
longer narrative.
The
writer merely eliminates
what precedes and
follows this group of incidents.

field
And though he
virtues,
hmits his
he gains thereby
in concentration and emotional intensity.
These
were
his selection less exacting,

lose.
he would
be almost certain to
His scenes then,
if
of character,
must not be
those necessitating slow development over a
long period, but instead be significant turningpoints
the character makes upon some new relation which alters the course of his life. ) The decision may be momentous or trivial as the nature of the story may demand; this is technically unimportant. But it is highly important that the
significant in that
some
decision or enters
writer carefully limit his selection of incidents

to those
which
will
make
the turning-point fully
intelligible,
but no more. The principle is, again, that of selection; art and cunning are revealed
This
selec-
in the rejection of the superfluous. tion
becomes increasingly exacting as the space which the author aims to fill becomes less.
Consider, as an illustration, Stevenson's story,
Markheim.
The theme
is
crisis in
the
life
of
weak man
one doomed
to failure.
The author
has selected that group of incidents which in-
40

to a recognition of his true self
volves the character in murder, and then leads
him
and
to con-
fession.
The
story, because of its shortness,
can
make no
attempt, as would a longer story, to
trace the slow disintegration of character to the
point with which, in this story,

these earlier steps of his
we begin. With downward career we
have no concern save as they are suggested in the

delineation of character necessary to
make
the
man
intelligible to us.
The
incidents relating
to his crime
with great fulness.
and confession are, however, told We must have insight into

if
the man's psychology

life
the
new
conditions of
once he
which he faces are to be convincing. But, is set unmistakably on the new path,
is
the story
done.
Our imaginations may supply

but with these the author
supplementary
is
details,
not concerned.
may
Such a turning-point in character development well be likened to a crossroads. The man

at the crossroads he hesitates,
has been proceeding on a straight road for some
time past;
and
his choice of possible
paths
is
fraught with mo-
immediate decision that we though this involve but the slighter afifairs of life, it is important by reason of the significance which the choice of direction
ment.
It
is
in the
are interested;
for,
implies.
We may
generalize, JJien,
thus much: the
THE UNITIES
volving a
crisis
41
shorter the series of vitally related incidents inof character,
the shorter the
space in which
we may
convincingly portray
that crisis. In a story of two or three thousand words the incidents must be few indeed; in five thousand words we may do more. Limited as must be our choice of incidents relating to a single character, it follows that
we
1
can scarcely portray in a brief narrative two or more decisions or turning-points of either one or
more
characters.
The
seen.
first difficulty is
one of
a sec-
space, as
we have
Equally vital
is
ond, that of divided attention.

reader's interest
demands that
Economy of the we tell but one

to dissipate the
story at a time.
To
divide our space between

is
two
crises or
two characters
This
is
interest in either.
also, in longer
true to
some degree,
works
of fiction;
is
but there the
division of attention
in part
compensated by
the possibility of greater individual development
both of character and situation.
The long novel

and taking on
one to another.
nor of the
sig-
'
may
new
properly be regarded as a group of related
stories,
each of interest in
itself,
significance
by
their relation
is
In a short narrative there

nificance
possibility neither
of so great individual elaboration
due
to correlation. in a short story unity of action.

/
We
demand
It should concern itself with
some
crisis,
some
42

life
turning-point in the
of a single character.
Though
this crisis
may,
it is true,
involve others
to a lesser degree,
of one person
ers as
still it is
primarily the story
and only incidentally includes othis,
tEey affect him.
This definition of imity of action

misleading in so far as
in terms of character.
is
however,
we have spoken solely
In many stories character minor importance, and our interest is mainly in the incidents themselves. The prinof
none the less binding. Let us confamous story, The Gold Bug. Though The Gold Bug is commonly regarded as a masterpiece, and though it is, undoubtedly, a vivid and compeUing story, I am not sure but
ciple here is
sider Poe's
there
tion.
is
a rather pronounced flaw in

reason for so thinking
its
is
constructhis.
My
In
It
casting about for a suitable illustration of unity

of action,
is,
my mind
reverted to this story.
remembered, a capital tale of adventure in which the decipherment of a parchment leads

I
to the discovery of buried treasure.
I recalled
the treasure hunt vividly, particularly that grew-
some
detail of the skull nailed to the
Hmb
of
the tree, and the gold
bug which the negro
dropped through the eye-socket.

highly unified yarn!
capital,
But when
I turned to Poe,
what was
my
surprise to find that the recovery
of the treasure
comes at a point considerably
THE UNITIES
prior to the
43
end of the story. What follows has do with the means whereby the mysterious parchment was deciphered. To Poe the story was primarily a mystery story; his interest lay
to in the solution of the problem.
To me,
it
the
reader, the interest lies chiefly in the adventure.

Is the story, then, unified?
To me
seems
two stories, inseparably bound up, to be sure, but none the less in so far distinct that my interest flags once the treasure is found.
Suppose,
then, that the order of narration were reversed,
and the parchment deciphered

tion for the treasure hunt.
for us as preparathis the case,
Were
the solution of the mystery would be but a step

to the treasure; there
would be no sense
of anti-
climax.
Poe, to
whom mysteries,
problems, and
cryptograms afforded the keenest joy, reversed
what
to
me
seems the true narrative order
for
the purpose of heightening our interest in the

riddle; of
what
and in so doing he has made two stories is but one, and so has dulled our interest
in this
in the second.
Whether or not you agree with me

judgment, the point raised
illustrates
what
is
meant by unity
of action in a story of incident.
We may
same
derive further illustrations from the
Suppose that Poe, after the modern manner, had sought to add a love-affair. The simplicity of his story would then have become
story.
44
obscured, for our interest would have been dis-
somewhat from mystery and adventure. You will observe that Poe is careful to avoid any
tracted
such mistake.
told
Moreover, though the story
is
by a minor participant in the action, we know little about him. Our attention is riveted to the one chief character and his adventures. Note, too, that characterization and background
are permitted but minor parts, for the story's
concern is with action. To emphasize these would again be to disconcert us. This unity of action of which we speak is really nothing more than a form of simplicity born of singleness of purpose. Illustrated in a good story (we may cite again The Cask of Amontillado) it is obvious enough. In actual storyconstruction it is not so easy to put into practice.
To
excise superfluous incidents conceived in the
fine vividness of
imagination and in themselves
entertaining,
is
a task calling for some heroism

It is
and much
clear-sightedness.
an obligation
the beginner finds most
difficult.
He
is
perhaps
and unable to appreciate the beauty of a naked simplicity. Thus he clutters the simple machinery of his
of decorative details
tale
enamoured
with superfluous incident
related
to the
action, to
be
sure,
and
interesting, but, in the
highest sense, irrelevant.

to achieve a true unity.
In so doing he
fails
THE UNITIES
Unity of Time
45
The
necessity of economizing the reader's at-
tention gives rise also to the problem of time.
How
long a period should the action of a story

^
We can lay down no absolute rule, but can say promptly the shortest time compatible
cover?
with the effective narration of the necessary inThe reason is not hard to discover. cidents.
If
between incidents two and three of my story/ there intervenes the space of a year, my reader
will find it difficult to conceive those incidents to
Both experience and imagination teU him that the vitality of any incident is weakened by the passage of so long a time. The most absorbing episode of a year ago is to him now of lesser consequence than many an exbe vitally related.
perience of the last few days, less truly important.
Between two story incidents widely separated in time there is a hke weakening of interest. And if considerable intervals occur between various incidents, the total effect will be
hmp indeed.
Incidents, to have the true relation of cause
and seem effect, as we have seen they must, should They must give the to happen in short space. illusion of experience itself, which is an uninterrupted flow.
first of all,
The
writer therefore endeavors,
to begin his story as near as possible
to its point of highest interest, relating antecedent
46

by various means which we
which remain?
figure.
events necessary to our understanding of the

story
shall discuss
in detail in a subsequent chapter.
But what
of
the
incidents
writer telescopes his action.
For these the Let us see what is
meant by the
We
shall
assume that the writer has in mind
a story based upon experience, modified, of course, and provided with a suitable and logical denouement, but in essence a ''true story."
carefully cuts
He
first
away extraneous
incidents, those
not logically necessary to the growth of the

action.
In so doing he has removed the story
from the realm of hf e, in which logical sequence of events is overlaid and obscured by irrelevancies
and he has made it to some degree art, selected and related incident with a purpose. As he examines the skeleton which he has so carefully
laid bare
by
his process of omissions
he
is
concer-
scious of rather long time-intervals

tain of the steps of his story.
between
The
incidents are
well enough related logically, but they occur over
a considerable period of time. Could this be shortened there would be a gain in intensity; his
story would be without the enfeebhng delays of which we spoke. Therefore he reduces the timeintervals as much as he dares, bringing the related parts of his story into
more immediate
connection.
If
a week in fact intervened be-
THE UNITIES
tween incidents four and
val
five,
47
if
and
this inter-
may
be safely shortened to a day, or better,

alteration, for
an hour, he makes the
he gains
be,
thereby in effectiveness.
references to time-intervals,
tion, seeking to
Or,
it
may
he
ac-
merely avoids, in so far as possible,
all specific
and emphasizes
intimate the flow of time only

reader
is
indirectly.
The
then unconscious of
definite time-intervals,
though aware in general
that time has passed.
There
is,
however, a check upon this foreshortIt
ening process.
cidents selected
may
be that between the

interval
to
inis
some considerable
is
be accepted as springing from the first, as, for instance, one indicating a radical development of character.
necessary
if
the second
People are usually slow to

given them that influences
alter;
time must be
effect.
may have
If
the story relates the hero's meeting with the

heroine, his conversation with her,
some
service
he
may
do, a second meeting, his growing love,
and
his proposal of marriage,

if
we need some
little
time to elapse
we
are to accept the character
change as convincing.
The
incidents might be
arranged so as to occur within a single day or

evening, but did they do so
lieve the hero truly in love.
we should not
be-
uations take place in real

exceptional,
Such sudden infatfife, but they are

of
and a story must be true not
48
exceptional experience but of typical experience.

l^J
between the same series of incidents there be permitted to elapse a slightly longer time, if
If
w.
they be spread over a week or two, we shall be

far
more
likely to accept
them
as plausible.
The writer, then, telescopes his much as he dares, his knowledge

ing as a check
artistic
incidents as
of life serv-
method.
upon the extreme exercise of his He may, indeed, overstep the

somewhat.
if
bounds
of naturalness
The
reader
will excuse a considerable degree of foreshorten-
ing as a convention of the art

story's action
exists
is
thereby the
made more
rapid.
But
far.
there
always the danger of going too
Good
fiction
sense, experience,
and the study
of
good
must
all
aid the writer in his determination of

.
the golden mean.
An extreme example
ally
of foreshortening artistic-
managed,
is
Stevenson's The Sire de Male-
Jllf^ tr oil's
Door. In this the hero meets the heroine one evening and marries her the next morning.
But
to render his solution plausible the writer
has carefully devised various compelling and

extenuating circumstances.
accept
his
These cause us to
great
effort.
assurances
without
Swiftness of action and a reasonable degree of

credibiHty are both achieved.
It is desirable,
then, that a story cover as
short a time as
is
compatible with the reader's
THE UNITIES
acceptance of
it
49
experience.
as typical of
human
There are many stories, however, which by their very nature cannot be so hurried. Intervals of
time must elapse
of
its essentials.
if
the story
is
to include certain
case,
.
Let us take an extreme

In
this the
Maupassant's The Necklace.
major (T
is
part of the action occupies but a day or two.
Then
action
occurs an interval of ten years, which

in
summarized
is
a paragraph.
After this
the
concluded within a few minutes.

it is true,
The
actual story incidents cover,

or three days.
but two
What
of the ten years' interval,
however, which the author not only does not

ignore,
but actually emphasizes?
It is
upon our
imaginative acceptance
of this long period of
time that the whole power of the story depends. Our minds must be staggered by it. We must not, however, dwell so long upon it and its happenings that the early incidents of the story lose
any of their vividness, for it is in contrast with them that the last incidents exercise their power
of pathos.
The author very
nicely bridges the
difhculty.
He
gives our imaginations a
moment
to grasp the significance of so long a period of the

life
which
in a
few sentences he summarizes.

specific incidents of the period;
in-
But he permits no
for to
do so would be to divert us from the
cidents previously narrated.
He
takes advan-
tage of the seeming difficulty, and yet maintains
so

But it is rather an exand the generalization we none the less binding.
the unity of his story.

ceptional instance,
have
laid
less
down
is
A
is
unusual instance of a story which, of
necessity, covers a considerable period of time,
Kipling's Baa^ Baa, Black Sheep.
Here the
is
action requires several years, for the story
concerned with the modification of a child's

character amid unwholesome surroundings.
shorter period would not produce the indelible

effect desired.
Let us note several

I
specific in-
stances of the author's skill in bridging
the
necessary intervals.
passages:
quote the transitional
Punch
said
it
hugely against his brown book.

.
.
accordingly and for a month, will, stumbled through the
The shiny
brass counters in the Office
where Uncle Harry went once every three months with a slip of blue paper and received sovereigns
in exchange.
.
.
As
soon as Punch could string a few pot-hooks
together
he wrote to Bombay demanding by return of post ''all the books in the world."
"I shall be there soon," said he to Black Sheep, one winter evenings when his face showed white as a worn silver coin under the lights of the chapel-lodge. A month later, he turned
.

THE UNITIES
. .
51
sharp round, ere half a morning's walk was completed.

.
They put him

shadow
to bed,
of his sickness lay
and for a fortnight the upon the house.

.
.
Of Judy he saw very

religious
little.
She was deeply

[At the beginning
at six years of age.
of the story
we
learned she was but three.]
As
time went on and the
memory
.
.
of
.
Papa and
Mama
became wholly
overlaid.
The weeks lengthened days came.

. . .
into months, dinA the holi-
The books lasted for ten days. came days of doing absolutely nothing.
Holidays came and holidays went.
Then
.
The weeks were interminable.

For the next
strictly
three weeks Black Sheep was allowed to do nothing.
Aunty Rosa withdrew and left Mama kneeling between her children, half laughing, half crying, in the very hall where Punch and Judy had wept five years before.
The instances cited are only the more obvious. Numerous little touches less easily detached from
their context serve to
keep the flow of time unare the mile-posts

all
checked.
The open references
upon the way.
And
are possessed of one
52

mark it openly, as But never do they inAlways, in the
links
obvious characteristic: they do not disguise the

passage of time; indeed they
is
essential to the story.
dicate a break in the narrative.

transitional
sentence,
some phrase
the
thought with that which has preceded.

the thread of narrative.
The
reader, keenly interested in the action, follows

first
Only incidentally
of the time covered
does he
make a mental note
since the last specific reference.
A series of these
marginal comments, and the reader accepts within a few pages the passage of months. The logic of the narrative is never broken to indicate
the flight of time.
it
That
is
incidental in so far as
vital to the story's
attracts attention,
though
progress.
The
haps,
artistic
its
handling of time discovers, per-
most striking illustration in Othello, The play demands the utmost closeness of narrative logic. Incident must crowd upon incident. Yet there must seem to be a lapse of sufficient time to permit the slow growth of Othello's jealousy. The two, rapid action and slow modification of character, are antagonistic. Yet both
are so artistically conceived that
to plan
it is
possible
two time schemes
for the play.
In one
the play covers seemingly a period of but a few

days.
In the other the action requires not days
but months.
The
reader accepts both unthink-
THE UNITIES
ingly,
S3
effect
and both
It
is
exercise their
due
upon
him.
paradoxical that this should be so,
but there
it is for
any writer
of stories to emulate.
study
of other of Shakespeare's plays will re-
veal the
same good
artistry,
though in few cases

the time covered
to so striking a degree as in Othello.
We may
by the
vincingness.
of time
is
summarize:
If
Make
is
action as short as
compatible with con-
the indication of the passage

it
essential
nitely given
and often must be subordinate do not

it;
defi-
let it
mar
the even
flow of the narrative.
Unity of Place
As
little
in action
and
time, so in place, the writer
seeks to dissipate the attention of the reader as

as possible.
In a short story,
if
the action the imagi-
occurs in too
many and diverse places,

if
nation will be fatigued,

the shifts demanded.
If
not bewildered, by
these are
for
the scenes in every inif
stance must be definite, and

there will, too, be
scriptive
detail.
little
many,
room
adequate detherefore,
The
writer must,
economize, as in the instance of time, and bring

his story to pass in
but few places.
With some
contrivance he should, in most instances, be

able to do this.
It should be his practice to
make but one change of scene when his first inSeveral scenes. clination prompts him to two.
54
if

set in a single
town or
city, are
usually
more
effective,
because easier to visualize, than are

that a single
is
those far apart and dissimilar;
house or room
still.
be the scene of action
better
Do not misunderstand;
is
as in the manipu-
lation of time, there
here no inflexible law.
An examination of good stories will show merely no unnecessary changes of scene; usually there are even fewer shifts than the average reader
could follow readily without confusion or loss of
interest.
Unity
of
place
is
seldom absolute.
of scene
With
is
rare exceptions
some sHght change
inevitable in the shortest of stories;
and the
longer the story the more changes there will

usually be;
certainly the
more changes there
may be
without
loss of effectiveness.
Yet to enumerate the changes of scene in several famous short stories will be to illustrate the general truth that the skilful writer makes very few. Thus in Poe's Purloined Letter we have
but a single change, that from the apartment of the narrator to the hotel of the minister D. The
scene in the latter place
is
noteworthy for
its
simple artistry in the treatment both of time
and place; it is really two scenes occurring on two successive days. Observe the transitional
sentences:
I . . . took gold snuff box
my
departure at once, leaving a

table.
upon the
THE UNITIES
The next morning / called for when we resumed, quite eagerly,
tion of the preceding day.
55
the snuff box,
the conversa-
The
called
reader
who has
visualized the scene
is
not
upon to wipe the picture from his imagination and shortly to recreate it, despite the fact that in the interval between the visits have ocnecessary
to
curred incidents
the
narrative.
These the author brings

fashion
in later in the following
In the meantime, I stepped to the cardrack, took the letter, put it in my pocket, and replaced it by a facsimile (so far as regards externals) which I had carefully prepared at my lodgings
.
In the same passage mention
is
made
of the
scene in the street without, to which the attention of one of the characters, not the centre of
interest, is attracted.
But
is
as this, too,
is
suborit,
dinate in interest, care
taken to minimize
of the
and the reader's visuaHzation

the action therein
is
room and
will
unmarred.
In other of Poe's stories the observant

of place.
note the same care to avoid unnecessary change
In some, indeed, as in The Pit and

is
the
Pendulum, the place
absolutely fixed;
the
action occurs within the walls of a single room.
Like attention to this obvious principle
is
to
be
noted in stories by other famous writers.
They
56

it is true,
do not always,
confine the action to a
single place, for the incidents selected will not
always so permit; it is merely a principle to which they conform as nearly as possible. But before we consider such stories and the means
by which
transitions of place,
effectively,
can be made most

sider stories in
when necessary, we should conof action is
which the place

is
not
fixed at
any time but
constantly moving, so
that
we can
scarcely say that the story occurs

is
even in a number of places. Our illustration

Poe's Cask of Amontillado.
In this the story progresses from the street

in carnival time to a house,
from the house to

that
is,
the cellars, and from the cellars to the cata-
combs.
The
place
is
never fixed:
the
scene ceases to change only
when we reach
the
very end of the story.
Immediately, as we read,
we
are struck with the likeness of the flow of
scene to that of time, which
we saw
to be char-
acteristic of well-constructed stories.
In these
there were
action,
no appreciable breaks
in the flow of
no unbridged intervals
of time
this
by
reason of a well-contrived coherence of incident.
What is
the position of the reader, the imaginary
onlooker, as he follows the story's characters in
the present instance?
He, of course, visualizes them in from the street to the catacombs.
their progress It is true
he
THE UNITIES
57
does not see everything which they actually

observed; he sees instead a series of selected and
blended objects.
It is as
faster
though he passed by
all
these at a pace pace too rapid to permit the observation of

details,
than that of reahty, a
but not so
is
fast that significant details,
those
by which the progress from one chamber
to another
made
quite clear,
may
not be
re-
corded.
The
reader fancies that he walks with
the characters at a normal pace, though in fact

his progress is greatly accelerated.
effect of
It
is
this
reahty at which the writer aims.
OmisBe-
sions, inevitable to selection, are
unnoted.
cause of the suspense which the story creates,
our progress seems even slow, and

the Hues impatient of the end.
we hurry over
and
Because
of this flow of scene so perfectly

it is
uninterruptedly maintained,
legitimate to
declare the unity of place constant throughout.
no strain upon the imaginano radical change which a sudden shift of setting would necessitate. We may regard the reader as one witnessing a procession. Or again, the incidents are like the changing panorama seen from a smoothly flying train: the countryside, not the observer, seems
Certainly, there
is
tion of the reader,
to move.
The
writer in fixing so firmly the
view-point of his reader has achieved the effect

of perfect unity of place in the story itself.
58
The problem in Poe's story is, we say, simple. The time is short, and the change of place, covered at an even speed,
is,
in the aggregate, slight.
The illustration met with in a

must be fused
avoids the difficulties which are

story of diverse scenes, those
actually far apart and different in kind, which

in a single narrative.
But
before
we proceed
to
an examination
of a story typical
of this problem, let us
pause for a
moment
to
consider the psychology underlying the whole
question of change of scene.
From what we have

we made to down a few
already learned in our
consideration of place, and from analogies which
the problem of time,

generalizations.
if
we may lay fancy we shall

in their effect
be psychologically sound
time and place as
we
regard change in
much
If
the
same
is
upon the
reader.
a narrative
broken, either
to indicate the passage of time or a change of scene, the effect
upon the reader
is
identical in
is
kind, however different in degree: he

tarily
momen-
awakened from the story illusion, the essence of which is an unbroken flow of impression. In other words, he has again to take up the ^read of the story. The time-interval is, however, more easily bridged than a change in place, for the nature of the incidents on either side the time gap may be the same; whereas to change from one scene to another requires a fresh crea-
THE UNITIES
59
tive act of the imagination rather than the resumption of a state of mind already created. We may then suppose that change in place,
requiring
more imaginative power
in the reader
than the acceptance of a time-interval,

less
would be
and,
seldom permitted by a
either
skilful writer,
when unavoidable,
would not so often be
successful or the artistic devices to efface the
fracture would be the more refined and subtle. That the unity of place is more exacting and
less often
achieved than the unity of time
is,
think, true.
story
may
cover a considerable
unified.
period of time and
still
be
But
if
in
Baa Baa Black Sheep
there were as
many
specific
indications of a change of scene as there are of
the passage of weeks or months, the story would
be far from creating
its
unified
impression.
are
either
What
changes of place must be,
bridged
by the device
of emphasizing the co-
herence of the action
which we
saw was true
also in the case of time-intervals
or
resort is
had to the flow

of Amontillado,
of scene, the device of
The Cask
There
is,
however, another method, closely
analogous to the flow of scene, which will often

serve, wholly or in part, to obviate difficulties.
When
the scene
is
not vital to the intelligibihty
or vividness of the action, the writer

his story with
may
tell
but
slight suggestion of definite
6o

as, in
background, just
enacts
itself in
time, there
may be no
The
story
definite indication of time-intervals.
such case as though freed from

It occurs
the restraints of time and place; the flow of incident creates the illusion of reahty.
nowhere in
of
episode,
particular,
and the
reader, conscious
for
no sharply defined setting is called upon for no
any
specific
effort to
change
is is
the scene in imagination.
His attention here
concentrated upon action or character; place

of
no importance. Yet another practice
of
good writers
is
to
is
economize in scene by recurring, when change

^^
inevitable, to a scene
which has already been
employed
that he
arity
is
for previous incident.
The
reader re-
creates the setting with facihty for the reason
aided
by memory.
The sense of familiis
which
this practice
evokes
also highly
valuable in impressing the reader with the truth

of the story; it
is
as though he returned to the
scene
story,
of
a former experience.
Maupassant's
not only
The Piece of String,
will illustrate
this last
method
of effecting transitions, but, as
well, the others previously
mentioned.
The
story begins with a description of
Norman
the
peasants coming to town on market-day;

scene here
first
is
a flowing one.
definite place is
indicated in the description of the square
to which the incoming peasants have led us.
THE UNITIES
From one of
6i
the doorways opening on this square Master Malandain observes Master Hauchecorne pick something from the mud. The scene and setting are definite and static.
The
story then turns to the hfe of the square,

transition to the next scene
is
and the
made
in
the following fashion:
Then, Httle by little, the square became empty, and when the Angelus struck midday those who
lived too far
to the
away
to go
home
hetook themselves
full of
various inns.
the
At Jourdain's
of every sort.
. .
common room was

yard was
customers, as the great

.
full of vehicles
dinner.
The inn is then described, and those seated at They are aroused by the drum of the
crier
town
later.
is
and rush
to the door to hear his
news
little
(anticipatory of the next incident).
Master Hauchecorne, dining with the rest, The to appear before the mayor. transition is thus made:
summoned
He
started off repeating

I
"Here
am
sir."
And
he followed
the brigadier.
The mayor was
waiting for him.
After this scene the place does not again be-
come
definite
for
a considerable space.
We
62

man
to his
scribed, for it is of
home, but this is not deno importance to the story. The incidents immediately following, though they cover a week and occur in a variety of
follow the
places, are thus
summarily dismissed:
of his adventure;
All
told
it
day long he talked
he
passed; at the wine-shop to people who were drinking; and after church on the following Sunday.
in the road to people
who
No
place
is
allowed to assume more than a

casual definiteness.
is:
momentary and most The next transition
On Tuesday of the next week he went to market at Goderville. Malandain standin^j in his doorway began to laugh.
.
. .
Here the
it is
scene,
though short,
is
is
definite;
but
identical with the first fixed scene of the:
story.
The next
of like sort:
When
inn.
.
.
he was seated at the table of Jourdain^s

.
The
last transition is:
He
returned home.
is
Again there
no definiteness of scene, either

defi-
here or in subsequent incidents.
Throughout the story there are but three

nite scenes
those in the square* in the inn, and
THE UNITIES
the mayor's
office.
63
The
first
two are again
briefly echoed, the writer
reveahng in these his
by refusing to devise new Our imaginative pictures are confined therefore to these parts of a single village. The incidents which do not occur here might happen anywhere, do happen anywhere, for they are attached to no specific place. The fleeting references to wine-shop and church produce but a momentary picture; these in no sense can be
economy
settings.
of materials
said
to
constitute
scenes.
We
we
is
should note,
are whisked to
also, the
simple transitions from place to place.
From
is
the reference to dinner
the dining-room at Jourdain's.
When
the hero
summoned
to the mayor's, it
said: *'He fol
lowed the brigadier."

our imaginations
tion.
He
is
then there, and
make no difficulty of the transiBut though content for the most part tci
background, the writer
is
picture the flow of events as unattached to a

specific
careful to at-
tach the most vital incidents to a definite setting.

It is as
though the stream of incident crystallized
at crucial moments,
and
in so doing
made
is
clear
the place of action.
Then
the action dissolves,
later to crystallize again.
The
writer
careful
not to
make
these pauses too frequent,
and as
we
up
recall the story
we
see only the square with
the tragic picture of the old peasant as he picks

his piece of string, or as
he
is
taunted by his
64

inn,
enemy; or the
whence, bewildered, he
later,
is is
summoned
his
to the
mayor and where,
he
angered and hurt as his fellows twit him with
supposed
theft.
A
is
few general principles emerge from our

it
rather long discussion of the unity of place:
well to present but few definite scenes, and
these coincident with the
most
vital episodes of
the story, serving thus to emphasize and
make
memorable such incidents. For the rest there need be no definite place; the incidents need be attached to no specific setting. Or the scene may be a flowing one and not static at all. Last and most important, transitions in scene must be so deftly made that the reader's thought and imagination easily bridge the gap this by reason
of the coherence of the narrative.
CHAPTER V
EXPOSITION AND PREPARATION
STORY must do more than

there
is
relate the vital
incidents of the plot;
another element,
is
purely expository, the object of which
to
make
the circumstances of the story intelligible to the

reader.
He must know who
are the characters,
something of their history, and their relations

past and present to one another, as well as other
antecedent and coincident matters.
This
in-
formation
may
be much or
little
as occasion
may demand.
technic,
The means whereby it is introduced into the story constitutes a problem in

a problem
dependent in large part
upon the choice of the point of view. As our introduction to the subject let us, then, select a story written from the point of view of the actor-narrator and examine the initial exposition. The story is Stevenson's, The Merry Men,
of
which I quote the second paragraph:

I
was
far
from being a native of these parts,
springing, as I did, from an unmixed lowland stock. But an uncle of mine, George Darnaway,
6s

66
after a poor, rough youth, and some years at sea, had married a young wife in the islands; Mary Maclean she was called, the last of her family; and when she died in giving birth to a daughter, Aros, the sea-girt farm, had remained in his posIt brought him in nothing but the session. means of Hfe, as I was well aware; but he was a man whom ill-fortune had pursued; he feared, cumbered as he was with the young child, to make a fresh adventure upon Kfe; and remained
at Aros, biting his nails at destiny. Years passed over his head in that isolation, and brought neither help nor contentment. Meantime our family was dying out in the lowlands; there is little luck for any of that race; and perhaps my father was the luckiest of all, for not only was he one of the last to die, but he left a son to his name and a Httle money to support it. I was a student at Edinburgh University, living well enough at my own charges, but without kith or kin; when some news of me found its way to Uncle Gordon on the Ross of Grisapol; and he, as he was a man who held blood thicker than water, wrote to me the day he heard of my existence, and taught me to coimt Aros as my home. Thus it was that I came to spend my vacations in that part of the country, so far from all society and comfort, between the cod-fish and the moor-cocks; and thus it was that now, when I had done with my classes, was returning thither with so light a heart that July day. (The Merry Men.)
There
is
no attempt here
to disguise the puris
pose of the paragraph, which
frankly inform-

ing,
67
and though somewhat more interesting than
the cast of characters on a playbill, or a description of stage setting, serves
much
is,
the
pose.
We
learn
who
the hero
same pursomewhat of
his history,
and
his reason for being at Aros;
we
learn, too, of his relatives
the character of the place,
and their history; and the time of year.

tell.
All this the author considers necessary to our
proper appreciation of what he has later to
What
of the fitness of the narrator to
be our
in-
formant?
to
With
his
own
history he
is,
naturally,
sufficiently familiar.
know
so
But can we suppose him much of his uncle and cousin? What
of learning the facts
means had he
he gives?
We
read that he had spent several vacations on
the island, and
by reason
of his kinship
we may
suppose him familiar with the superficial facts

of his uncle's history.
But he
states, also, that
his uncle feared to adventure

''biting his nails at destiny."
it
and so remained
This,
if
we
accept
without criticism,
we must
attribute to the
hero's powers of observation, or to confidences

his uncle
may have made.
There
is,
indeed,
nothing in the statement
difficult of acceptance,
and the reader passes over it without question. Yet it serves to define a difficulty of exposition The in a story told by one of the participants. information must be such as lies reasonably within the knowledge of the narrator. He must

68

know
too much, or the story illusion, which
not
we gladly accept if we may, will be incomplete. At no point may the actor-narrator introduce
exposition other than that which comes naturally
within the circle of his observation.
For our second instance

told
let
us select a story
These three expository paragraphs follow immediately upon the
by
the author-omniscient.
opening dialogue of Kipling's Without Benefit oj

Clergy:
The man did not move. He was sitting on a low red-lacquered couch in a room furnished only with a blue and white floor-cloth, some rugs, and a very complete collection of native At his feet sat a woman of sixteen, cushions. and she was all but all the world in his eyes. By every rule and law she should have been otherwdse, for he was an Englishman, and she a Mussulman's daughter bought two years before from her mother, who, being left without money, would have sold Ameera shrieking to the Prince of Darkness if the price had been
sufficient.
It was a contract entered into with a Hght heart; but even before the girl had reached her bloom she came to fill the greater portion of John Holden's hfe. For her, and the withered hag her mother, he had taken a little house overlooking the great red-walled city, and foimd when the marigolds had sprung up by the well in the courtyard* and Ameera had established

herself according to her
69
own
ideas of comfort,
and her mother had ceased grumbling at the inadequacy of the cooking-places, the distance from the daily market, and at matters of housekeeping in general that the house was to him Any one could enter his bachelor*s his home. bungalow by day or night, and the life that he led there was an unlovely one. In the house in the city his feet only could pass beyond the outer courtyard to the women's rooms; 'and when the big wooden gate was bolted behind him he was king in his own territory with Ameera And there was going to be added to for queen. this kingdom a third person whose arrival Holden felt inclined to resent. It interfered
with his perfect happiness. It disarranged the orderly peace of the house that was his own. But Ameera was wild with deUght at the thought The love of a of it and her mother not less so. man, and particularly a white man, was at best an inconstant affair, but it might, both women argued, be held fast by a baby's hands. "And then," Ameera would always say, "then he will never care for the white mem-log. I hate them all I hate them all." "He will go back to his own people in time," said the mother; "but by the blessing of God that time is yet afar off."
We learn from this several things

to this relationship, the place,
the present
relations of the characters, the incidents leading
and something
is
of
the man's nature.
As
the point of view
that
of the omniscient author,
we
accept without
70

all
demur
that he
tells us.
He
is
supposed to
know
effect
these things.
directed to
Our later criticism must be the manner of the exposition, and its
into
upon the action
which
it
has been inshall ignore
corporated.
For the moment we
these points and consider as a third instance the
point of view of the author-observant,

^f esses
/
who
pro-
ignorance of circumstances antecedent to
the story.
What he
tells
us must be in dialogue
ând description, elements of the action itself. How may we separate from these the purely
expository element?
precede the discussion.
But our illustration must The passage is from

vol-
The Love of Romance, of E. Nesbit's clever ume, The Literary Sense:
shone.
She opened the window, at which no light All the other windows were darkly shutThe night was still only a faint breath tered.
:
moved among the restless aspen leaves. The ivy round the window whispered hoarsely as the
casement, swung back too swiftly, rested against She had a large linen sheet in her hands. Without hurry and without delayings she knotted one corner of it to the iron staple of the window. She tied the knot firmly, and further secured it with string. She let the white bulk of the sheet fall between the ivy and the night, then she climbed on to the window-ledge, and crouched There was a heart-sick there on her knees. pause before she grasped the long twist of the sheet as it hung let her knees slip from the
it.

71
supporting stone and swung suddenly by her hands. Her elbows and wrists were grazed against the rough edge of the window-ledge the sheet twisted at her weight, and jarred her shoulder heavily against the house wall. Her arms seemed to be tearing themselves from their But she clenched her teeth, felt with sockets. her feet for the twdsted ivy stems on the side of the house, found foothold, and the moment of almost unbearable agony was over. She went down helped by feet and hands, and by ivy and sheet, almost exactly as she had planned to do. She had not known it would hurt so much that was all. Her feet felt the soft mould of the border: a stout geranium snapped under her She crept around the house, in the tread. house's shadow found the gardener's ladder and so on to the high brick wall. From this she dropped, deftly enough, into the suburban lane: dropped, too, into the arms of a man who was waiting there. She hid her face in his neck, trembhng, and said, ''Oh, Harry I wish I hadn't!" Then she began to cry helplessly. The man, receiving her embrace with what seemed in the circumstances a singularly moderated enthusiasm, led her with one arm still lightly about her shoulders down the lane: at the corner he stood still, and said in a low
voice
"Hush
stop crying at once
I've something
to say to you."
She tore herself from his arm and gasped. "Oh, how dare "It's not Harry," she said. you!" She had been brave till she had dropped
72
into his arms.
Then the need for bravery had seemed over. Now her tears were dried swiftly and suddenly by the blaze of anger and courage
in her eyes.
''Don't be unreasonable," he said, and even at that moment of disappointment and rage his "I had to get you away voice pleased her. somehow. I couldn't risk an explanation right under your aunt's windows. Harry's sprained He couldn't come." cricket. his knee sharp resentment stirred in her against the lover who could play cricket on the very day of
an elopement. "He told you

tray
to
come?
Oh, how could he be-
me!"
dear girl, what was he to do? He couldn't leave you to wait out here alone perhaps for hours." "I shouldn't have waited long," she said sharply; "you came to tell me: now you've told me you'd better go." "Look here," he said with gentle calm, "I do wish you'd try not to be quite so silly. I'm Harry's doctor and a middle-aged man. Let me help you. There must be some better way out of your troubles than a midnight flight and a despairingly defiant note on the pin-cushion." " I didn't," she said. "I put it on the mantelpiece. Please go. I decline to discuss anything
"My
with you."
"Ah, don't!" he said; "I knew you must be a very romantic person, or you wouldn't be here; and I knew you must be rather sill well, rather young, or you wouldn't have fallen in love with

Harry.
73
But
and
practical
I did not think, after the brave manner in which you kept your
appointment, I did not think that you'd try to behave Hke the heroine of a family novelette. Come, sit down on this heap of stones there's nobody about. There's a light in your house now. You can't go back yet. Here, let me put my Inverness about you. Keep it up around your chin, and then if anybody sees you they won't know who you are. I can't leave you
alone here. You know what a lot of robberies there have been in the neighborhood lately; there may be rough characters about. Come now, let's see what's to be done. You know you can't get back unless I help you." ''I don't want you to help me; and I won't go back," she said. But she sat down and pulled the cloak up round her face. "Now," he said, *'as I understand the case it's this. You live rather a dull life with two tyrannical aunts and the passion for ro-
mance. ..." "They're not tyrannical only one's always ill and the other's always nursing her. She
makes her get up and read to her in the night. -" That's her Hght you saw "Well, I pass the aunts. Anyhow, you met " Harry somehow " It was at the Choral Society. And then they
stopped my going because he walked homa with me one wet night." "And you have never seen each other since?" "Of course we have."

74

"And communicated by some means more
romantic than the post?" "It wasn't romantic. It was tennis-balls." "Tennis-baUs?" "You cut a slit and squeeze it and put a note in, and it shuts up and no one notices it. It wasn't romantic at all. And I don't know why I should tell you anything about it." "And then I suppose there were glances in church, and stolen meetings in the passionate hush of the rose-scented garden." " There's nothing in the garden but geraniums," she said, "and we always talked over the wall he used to stand on their chicken house, and I used to turn our dog kennel up on end and stand on that. You have no right to know anything about It, but it was not in the least romantic." "No that sees itself! May I ask whether it was you or he who proposed this elopement?"
But
for
one or two touches which intimate the

thoughts, the point of view here
is
girl's secret
strictly
observant and unobtrusive.
Virtually
we have
the lines of a play, the description serv-
ing as the stage business.

descriptive touches
From the dialogue and we <nust not only follow the
story action, but also grasp the present situation,
and learn from what it has developed. This we have no difficulty in doing. We learn of the elopement and the manner of courtship which
preceded.
We
gather something of the char-
acters of those concerned,
and our
interest
is

aroused in the
75
man who
girl.
extorts all this infor-
mation from the

it
The
dialogue serves the

If
double purpose of exposition and narration.

does
all this
without seeming at any

it is
forced or unnatural,
moment good dialogue, and we
take an intellectual pleasure in observing the

author's dexterity.
Dialogue, to serve this dual purpose, must have

recourse to various expedients so that talk relating antecedent events
may
be
elicited in
natural manner.
prevailed
ship.
Not every young lady can be
upon to tell the details of her courtAnger is the device employed, a device hoary in stage-craft, which, dependent upon tricks of this kind, has developed many. Other expedients by which dialogue may be turned to
the exposition of antecedent events will readily
occur to every one.

client's position
lawyer
may
rehearse his
and thus acquaint us with im-
portant facts;
a letter
may
be introduced into
the story, or a newspaper clipping, or a passage
from Who^s
his visitor,
Who ;
a palmist
may
tell
the
life
of
and from the
visitor's
conduct we
may
judge the information to be exact. In The Rise of Silas Lapham, Mr. Howells introduces a reporter who asks the hero the important
facts of his career for
In The Scarlet
newspaper publication. from the talk of the Puritans gathered about Hester Prynne in the pillory
Letter,
76

learn of her offence
we
and other relevant

of these devices
is
cir-
cumstances.
The merit
that,
while they serve to inform us,

story to be progressing.
we
yet
feel
the
feel
This we do not
when
tell
the author steps aside from his story to
us what
we need
to
know.
Nevertheless the greater number of good stories
upon dialogue and description Though they employ it to a considerable degree, they depend chiefly upon The feeling which prompts direct exposition.
do not
rely solely
for exposition.
this choice
is,
doubtless, that the obviousness

of direct exposition is less haz-
and conciseness
ardous than
the
indirect
or
dramatic
style.
Nothing
illusion
is
so
bad as dialogue forced into an im-
natural channel for the story's purposes.

to
The
be satisfactory must be complete. Authors employ, therefore, a variety of means to
make
the story clear:
they
antecedent events; they

of the characters, which,
may sketch briefly may read the thoughts

if
turned to the past,
serve as exposition;
for
the setting forth of

If all
present relations, they employ dialogue.

these
means
are utilized, the point of view of the
author-omniscient (or that of the actor-narrator)

is
inevitable.
Before
let
we
take up further aspects of this topic
us turn for a
moment
to the passages
quoted
from Stevenson and Kipling and note
their place

in the story.
ning.
77
Neither comes at the very begin-
Stevenson introduces
The Merry
Men
with a brief narrative paragraph which serves to

get the story under way.
Kipling begins with
fairly long scene in dialogue,
which serves
in
part an expository purpose.

explain the situation.
Kipling's explanation
it
is
My
Then he pauses to own feeling is that
unduly long, coming as
does sharp upon an interesting passage in
dialogue.
In The Merry
first
Men
the difficulty
is
not so great, for our interest in the story as

aroused by the
paragraph,
is
tepid, so that
the author's digression
own words
seems
this, too, in
the hero's
not
much
to matter.
The
the
keener the interest aroused at the outset,
greater the contrast with the expository matter

following.
It is for this reason that
many
authors preface
the story with the exposition.

sant's
Thus Maupas-
The Coward:
in society as "the handsome His name was Viscount Gontran
sufficient
He was known
SignoUes."
Joseph de Signolles. An orphan and the possessor of a fortune, he cut a dash, as they say.
style
He had
speech to make people think him clever, a certain natural grace, an air of nobility and pride, a gallant mustache and a gentle eye, which the women Hke. He was in great demand in the salons, much
sufficient fluency of
and presence,
78

own
fair dancers; and he aroused in sex that smiling animosity which they always feel for men of an energetic figure. He had been suspected of several love affairs well adapted to cause a young bachelor to be much
sought after by
his
esteemed. He passed a happy, unconcerned in a comfort of mind which was almost complete. He was known to be a skilful fencer, and with the pistol even more adept. "If I ever fight a duel," he would say, "I shall choose the pistol. With that weapon I am sure of killing my man."
life,
The
its
exposition here
is
brief
is
but adequate to
vital to the story.
purpose, and every detail

discussion has so far
Our
position only of present

nificance.
Still
had to do with exand retrospective sigis
more important
that exposi-
tion
which anticipates the action to come, so that in the heat of the story the action need not
illustrates
this
pause for explanations essential to clearness.
The passage from The Coward
function of exposition admirably.
We
learn of
SignoUes that he was gallant and wished to cut
a figure before
women;
that though expert with
sword and
All this
is
is
pistol,
he had never fought a duel.
vital to the story, for it explains
what
to come.
From
this introduction the experi-
enced reader anticipates

for
much
all
of the action,
details
If the
he has learned to observe

sees
fit
which
author
an author
to give him.

knows
tion.
79
his business
and
selects as
its
he should, no
detail will
be without
reasonable implica-
We
guess, therefore, that Signolles will
fight
a duel over a woman.
From
his expressed
desire to
employ
pistols in
such a contingency
so that he
may
be "sure of his man," we susto

disaster.
pect him to be somewhat of a braggart, and despite

his
marksmanship doomed
The manner
in
of his failure constitutes the story;
yet knowing so
much
as
we
do, our interest

is it
is
no sense weakened; rather
enhanced by
anticipation.
In Kipling's story also we have this foreknowl-
though less explicit. The remark of Ameera that Holden will return to his own peoConple in time, we feel prophetic of the end.
edge,
scious of Holden's genuine passion for the
girl,
we
surmise that only some tragic event can force
the issue.
What
is
that
is,
we read
to see.
How
trated
great
this necessity of
an accurate
preparation for events to come
may be well illus-
certain artistry of Scott.
by a passage from Stevenson upon the unIn Guy Mannering,

tales,
one of Scott's hastily constructed
occurs
the incident which Stevenson quotes:
"I remember the tune well," he says, "though cannot guess what should at present so strongly He took his flageolet recall it to my memory." from his pocket and played a simple melody.
"
So

.
Apparently the tune awoke the corresponding She immediately associations of a damsel. took up the song:
.
.
"'Are these the links of Forth/ she said; *0r are they the crooks of Dee,
Or the bonny woods of Warroch Head That I so fain would see?'
"By
On
heaven!" said Bertram, "it
is
the very
ballad."
quotation two remarks fall to be made. an instance of modern feeling for romance, this famous touch of the flageolet and the old song is selected by Miss Braddon for Miss Braddon's idea of a story, like omission. Mrs. Todger's idea of a wooden leg, were something strange to have expounded. As a matter of personal experience, Meg's appearance to old Mr. Bertram on the road, the ruins of Derncleugh, the scene of the flageolet, and the Dominie's recognition of Harry are the four
this First, as
strong notes that continue to ring in the mind The second point after the book is laid aside. The reader will observe is still more curious. a mark of excision in the passage as quoted by me. Well, here is how it runs in the original: "a damsel, who, close behind a fine spring about half-way down the descent, and which had once supplied the castle with water, was engaged in bleaching linen." A man who gave in such copy would be discharged from the staff of a Scott has forgotten to prepare daily paper.
8i
the reader for the presence of the "damsel"; he has forgotten to mention the spring and its relation to the ruin; and now, face to face with
back and starting crams all this matter, tail foremost, into a single shambling sentence. It is not merelybad EngHsh or bad style; it is abominably bad
his omission, instead of trying
fair,
narrative besides.
In the artistry exhibited in
this
important
matter writers vary widely.

give
Some
are even too
and overmany hints. Thus in De Morgan's novel. Somehow Good, so great stress is laid upon the heroine's love for swimming that we expect
well aware of the necessity for preparation,
nothing short of a shipwreck or a second deluge.
The
discriminating reader treasures every hint
granted him, but he resents overemphasis as
an insult to
his intelligence.
Poe's Cask
of Amontillado
is
an
excellent,
though somewhat obvious,

ful artistry in exposition,
illustration of care-
both retrospective and
anticipatory.
of passages,
I shall call attention to a
number
though the reader should examine
them
in their context.
The introductory para-
graph explains the motive of the story
revenge.
is
We
shall
are promised revenge of which the victim
not
fail
to
know
the source, but for which
the doer shall go unpunished.
This
the proare
nouncement
of the story's theme.
Then we
82

had one weakness: he prided
told that Fortunate
himself
upon
his connoisseurship in wine.
We
expect, from this, poison, but hope for something
more novel and exciting. At the beginning of the action we

this suspect
find For-
tunato under the influence of wine, and from

a suspicion
"I was
so
him an easy prey to his enemy, certain when Montressor says: pleased to see him that I thought I
made
should never have done wringing his hand."
Knowing Montressor's
design.
secret purpose,
we un-
derstand his pleasure to spring from some evil
A little later Fortunato offers to accomto the latter's wine-cellars for
pany Montressor
the purpose of testing the wine.
The
sinister
stratagem emerges more clearly as Montressor

describes
cellars,
the unhealthful atmosphere of the which cannot but be dangerous to one
with a cough.
Later:
will
go back; your health is prerespected, admired, beloved; you are happy, as once I was. You are a man to be missed."
cious.
"Come, we
You are rich,
Again:
"Enough," he
said,
kill
nothing; it will not a cough."
"the cough is a mere me. I shall not die of
"True
true," I replied.

There are other obvious
citation will suffice:
hints,
83
but one more
"Then you
"How?'^
are not of the brotherhood."
"You
are not of the masons." "Yes, yes," I said, "yes, yes."
"You?
Impossible!
mason?"
"A "A
mason," I replied. sign," he said.
"It is this," I answered, producing a trowel from beneath the folds of my roquelaire.
The
surprise of this
is
admirable, though
it in-
timates the catastrophe perhaps too clearly.
In classifying
all
these touches as exposition
we
are, it
term.
may be objected, Many are integral
doing violence to the

parts of the action,
to
and do more than forecast incidents

they interest of themselves.
criticism.
come;
It
is
not a valid
Exposition, as in The Coward,
may
or
simply inform us of things

it
we should know;
action,
may come
as dialogue
and
and serve
a double purpose
narrative
main
of
Yet expository
reader's
in the
knowledge
and expository. for it makes the impending events greater

it is,
than that of the actors in the story.

If,
then, in a
good
story,
important turns of
action are clearly predicted,
we must at this point

story struc-
consider accident and coincidence, and determine
what
part,
if
any, these
may play in
84
ture.

Life
abounds
in accidental happenings,
by which we mean
anticipated.
turns of fate that cannot be

is
Nothing
is
accidental in a sense;
that
is,
everything
the result of natural law,
and
ator
this result is predictable to
any one
fully
cognizant of the causes.

life
To
the all-seeing Cre-
may work
This
itself
out like a problem in
mathematics, and
in its terms.
its
conclusion be ever inherent

is
not the case, however,

things, it
is
with
human
vision.
Some
true,
we
may
safely predict
from our knowledge

fall
of life
and human
death?
relations.
tile
But how may I know my

from the roof
of the
may
building before which I pass and I be instantly

killed.
Accidents no
less
extraordinary occur
daily, as the
newspapers
attest.
What
use
may
best
the story writer
make
of such accidents?
clear
understanding of the matter
may
be had by an examination of the point of view

of author
and
reader.
To them,
is,
the developsubject to
life
ment
of the story is not, as is
life,
accidental happenings, but
as the whole of
to the Creator, predictable.
Thus the hero
of
the story
may
not
know
as he rides into battle

I,
that he goes to his death; but the author and

the reader,
know
this as certainly as
from a
ghostly premonition.
The death
of
the hero
has been predetermined, and the action so designed as to intimate clearly this d6nouement.

The
prearrangement, but the author, and to a
degree, the reader, view events
85
characters of the story are unaware of this

less
plane of understanding.
from a higher For them chance does
not
exist;
this characteristic of life has, in the
story,
been done away with.

is
story
more
logical,
that
is,
Thus we say the more predictable
than
life.
Much
of our pleasure in reading lies
in our appreciation of this story logic.
accidental,
it is
happening from the point of view of the character may not always be guessed from the early circumstances of the story. Sometimes
of the accidental
The exact nature

that
is,
desirable to prepare only in general terms
for the event to
come,
its
exact nature being
left
ambiguous and thus exciting our curiosity and

interest.
Often, however, the very character of
may be predicted. Thus in The Cask of Amontillado the reader guesses almost
the conclusion
exactly the expression of Montressor's revenge.
In Kipling's Without Benefit of Clergy

early that Toto
we know
and Ameera will die of the plague. In Hamlet and Romeo and Juliet we do not at first know the exact means by which the hero of each shall die, though that means is clear some
time before the
of
result.
The tone
of the story,
which we have later to speak, determines always the character of the conclusion. The
preparatory incidents intimate with varying de-
86

means by which
Life
is
is
grees of clearness the specific
the conclusion
realized.
Coincidences are a kind of accident.

filled
with them.
friend
It is a coincidence
that I
meet a
v/
on the
street in Paris or in
New
if
Zealand.
the result
is
A
is
story permits coincidehces only

if
not momentous, or
the coincidence
at the basis of the story.
make
the point clear.
Let us endeavor to The story may grow out
two characters thrown together in the haphazard fashion of life. With this we do not quarrel; the writer may, at the outset, make whatsoever assumption he choose. But suppose the story under way and everything dependent upon the meeting of two persons, the whereabouts of each unknown to the other. That they will meet is a chance in a million. If I seize upon that chance I make too momentous a result hinge upon too slight a
of the chance meeting of
possibility.
feels I
My
in
reader
is
incredulous, for he
am
I
forcing probabilities unduly.
Smith,
whom
knew
I
is
profession,
Des Moines, Iowa, a lawyer by meet in Vladivostock. The cirimprobable;

if,
cumstance
pared
travel,
in a story,
it
is,
much
depends upon
this meeting,
unless pre-
for, incredible.
But
if
both interested in Russian
affairs,
Smith and I are and fond of

at the outset of
permissible, for
and
this is
made known
is
the story, then the meeting

the sort.
87
the reader has been led to expect something of
The
writer,
who
deals not in chance,
but in the
logical
sequence of events, must pre-
pare for coincidences by previous suggestion.
Then, whatever they
may
be in
life,
they cease
in the story to be accidents at
all.
I once read a story developed in the following
A young woman has broken her engagement with a young man because of a misunderterms
:
standing.
old lady
She meets, on a railway journey, an
unknown
to her,
who
volunteers the
story of her son's broken engagement,
and makes
clear the honorable cause of misunderstanding.
The
sion.
girl is, of course,
the son's former fiancee,

to a
and thus events are shaped

There are here too
is
happy conclushould meet
many
chance elements
girl
involved.
as they do
That the mother and
in itself improbable; that the
mother
should take a stranger

ble strangers
affairs of
and
this
one
It
of all possi-
into her confidence concerning the

is
her son
incredible.
might occur
it.
in
life,
but in a story we should not believe

is
The mechanism
inadequate to the story's de-
mands; the two persons must be brought together and made to talk in some more plausible
fashion.
Not
infrequently the writer will violate the
consistency of his characters to force a story

conclusion.
This
is
of like kind
with accident
88
and coincidence, for the story turns upon a deviation from its own conditions. An example may
be found in
Guy Wetmore
Caryll's otherwise
sound story The Next Corner.

:
The
situation
is
this A young diplomat who has run through his means determines upon suicide. As he returns to his apartments he meets with an odd character who demands a drink, and whom the hero, in whim, invites to eat with him in his rooms. They talk, and the guest suspects his host's purpose of suicide. All this is credible, and we accept it readily. But when the visitor pro-
duces a revolver, and, intimidating his host,
ties
him
securely in a chair,
we
are unconvinced.
Why
easily
should a
man
It
is
resolved on death be so
true that he might be,
cowed?
but no revelation in his character hitherto has

I
ed us to expect the inconsistency when

reason for his action
is
it
occurs.
The
that
it is
necessary
to the solution of the story.
He must
he
is
remain
then to
bound
until the next morning, for
receive a cablegram announciiij the inheritance

of a bequest
which solves
plausible,
his dSficulties,
and
is
re-
moves
Ithe
all
cause for suicide.
The
story
in
many ways
but the inconsistency of
character at the crucial
moment
unprepared for
and
fails
this
is
a fatal weakness.
Even the
to
excitement induced by the incidents

blind us to the improbability.

In the instance
cited,
89
that of a character
call
change unanticipated, we
adequate motivation;
cause apparent to
the weakness insufficient
there
was not
move a man such
as portrayed
to the action described.
Motivation thus in-
volves the question of character-drawing as well

as of adequate preparation, that
is,
announce-
ment
of
impending action.
In As You Like It
Oliver, the
wicked brother, undergoes a sudden
transformation, makes restitution to Orlando, and wins the love of Celia. The change is inadequately motived, and the action dependent upon the change is consequently weak. Furthermore, we were unprepared by any hint for so marvellous a transformation whereby we might have been led to anticipate Oliver's change of heart, even though we disbelieved in it.
Weak
is
motivation,
that
is,
action resulting
from defective or inexplicable characterization,

only too
common
in all
but the best
literature.
The hero must be put
into hazardous situations
for the creation of suspense.
Therefore passing
strangers conceive violent dislikes
and pursue
be saved;
assist
him with various menaces.

therefore
He must
other characters
is
inexpHcably
him.
This
but a variant upon the employ-
ment
it is
of accident or coincidence.
is
To
the hero
truly an accident that he
endangered or
saved, but the cause therefor springs from
an
go

illogical
inadequate or
motivation of character.
another element inAccident, coinof
Yet our discussion has not touched the root

of the matter.
There
is
volved in the rationalization of experience which

is
the essence of a good story.
cidence,
life,
and weak motivation, true perhaps

is
are unsatisfactory in a story, for the reason
that a cause
not assigned for each
effect;
and
a story, being a logical structure, must be a chain of causes and effects. Not only this, but
the cause must be adequate to the effect;
vital a conclusion slight a cause.
too
must not depend upon too

oi
The
instances of Bruce and the spider and
the horseshoe-nail which lost a kingdom are

cases in point.
Their moral
is
that great re-
Tliis, in life, sults depend logically upon trifles. is true, but in a story the discrepancy between the immediate cause and its results should not
be great.
the road,
The hero stumbles over a stone

and
fall,
in
his
enemy's bullet miscarries.

the stone and antic-
Even though we have seen

ipated the
too
slight cause.
much depends
is
here upon a
trivi-
disaster
avoided by a
ality or, in another instance,
caused thereby.
This
is
a shock to our logical sense or to some
deeper sense of justice with which the universe

is
not altogether in harmony. Stevenson notes somewhere a vital turn of story-action dependent

upon a mistake
in time.
91
are turned back,
The hands of a clock and an otherwise unavoidable

If the
happening thus prevented.

were
vital,
trivial,
circumstance
as
it is
the
means would
suffice;
means is inadequate. In life we are shocked when chance plays too large a part in destiny and moulds events in haphazard fashion. Our sense of justice demands that great results hinge upon commensurate causes. It is a matter
the
of logic.
If
a chain of causes
last,
is
established, each
more
vital
than the
beginning evolve as
we may from a trivial momentous a conclusion as

the intervening causes are
first
we
choose.
But
if
removed and the

sion,
trivial
cause brought
abruptly in contrast with a catastrophic concluthe disharmony

is
offensive to us.
We
then enter the realm of accident, with which

story writing has not to do.
Accident and coincidence, then,

the writer's aid in plot solution,
if
called to
must be
so pre-
pared for that they are no longer, for the story,
what these terms indicate. A vital development of the story must not depend upon chance, but upon forces previously set in motion. If
the incident
is
not vital to the action, but merely
contributory, accident
objectionable, for they have
and coincidence are less some sanction from
the world without.
It is
when
the stake
is
large
that they are inadequate.
92

The
surprise story seems at first glance to
violate the principle
we have
laid
down: that a
story
is is
a logical structure, the conclusion of

predictable from the initial incidents.
which
It is
not in reality such a violation.

tone
The
gen-
eral tenor of its conclusion

its
must harmonize with

tragic
established
be
or humorous,
pleasant or unpleasant, as the case
may
be.*
The
exact terms of the conclusion are not, howIf
ever, so apparent.
they are too obvious we

interest;
cannot anticipate
stories
them with
that
is,
most
terms
should,
therefore,
contaia some slight

the
sj)ecific
element of surprise;
guessed.
of the conclusion should not
be too accurately
In the true surprise story the terms of the

conclusion not only should be unguessed, but
the imexpectedness should give pleasure.
This
that
pleasure cannot be, however, unless the reader

feels
the surprise to be justifiable, that
is,
he has deceived himself into expecting one solution,
whereas a second was equally inherent in
the terms of the story.
The
detective story will
afford a simple illustration.

virtually constructs his
The
writer here
story backward.
He
and
is
commits
his crime in
a certain fashion, conas
structs a chain of antecedent circumstances,
then endeavors to obscure this chain.
It
See
chapter XIII, "Unity of Tone."

though he
first
93
made a path
to his goal, the ob-
jective of the story,
and then, that the path
might not be too obvious, constructed a number of blind or false paths which cross the true and
perplex
to
it.
The
logical
sequence of incidents
is,
change the
figure,
embedded
in a
mass
of
irrelevant happenings
which serve to confuse
the reader.
ure.
In this maze the reader finds pleaslooks back
As he
upon the story he should,

se-
however, be able to discern clearly the true
quence from which he has been legitimately seduced. He^hould feel that, had he been more
clever,
he
all
wuld
have arrived at the correct
rather than the false solution.
Not
writers of detective stories respect this
obHgation.
The
story
is
too bafiiing, and the
reader feels at the end a distinct sense of dis-
appointment.
entitled
The game was not a
fair
one;
he has been tricked.

its sequel.
I recall a detective story
both of which are,

In the
of
The Mystery of the Yellow Room and The Perfume of the Lady in Black, which violate this requirement, and
therefore, not honestly constructed.
first
the criminal proves to be the chief
the detective bureau.
How
this
criminal,
long sought
by the
police, could in a
few years
In the
enter the force, rise to be chief,

tection the while,
and escape de-
defies explanation.
second story the criminal kidnaps the prospec-
94
tive

second husband of his
own former
wife,
disguises himself, and, taking the place of the
bridegroom, himself marries the woman.
We
cannot swallow so impossible a situation, and,
inasmuch as the story turns upon it, we are bewildered and baffled, and in the end disgusted
not with our own inability

tery,
to solve the
mys-
but with the author's craftsmanship. has not played the game fairly.
He
and
fol-
The
surprise should, then, be prepared for,
our momentary shock at the revelation be
lowed by acquiescence and pleasure.

viewing the story
Upon
re-
we should
detect the hints
which would have

been truly
alert.
we
shall feel
sufficed to guide us had we These must be adequate or ourselves to have been cheated;
they must not, however, be too transparent, for

the story will then
fail
of its purpose.
It is
not
easy to hit upon the mean.

Stockton's The Lady or the Tiger
is
the most
famous example of the surprise

the author builds
ject to
story.
In this
up a
series of incidents sub-
two
solutions.
Either will be acceptable,

of
for the story turns
upon an ambiguous point
psychology.
fusal to
The surprise is the commit himself to either
author's realternative;
he leaves the nicely balanced problem to the The device is excellent, but cannot reader.
often
be repeated.
Stockton employed
it

second time, but with
ager of Hesitancy.
less effect, in
95
The DiscourO. Henry employs a variant

Thimble.
O.
upon
it
in
Thimble
for the
Henry has
written a
number
fall,
of excellent surprise stories,
but these
division of our subject,
most part, under a later "Unity of Tone," a
chapter supplementary to
here discussed.
many
of the points
The importance
appreciate
of
the principles
we have
stories.
formulated in this chapter the reader will best
upon an examination
of
many
Let him ask himself these questions: Why does the author tell me this? Is he overexplicit? Or,
at the conclusion of a story:
Did the
writer
tell
me
These questions the author endeavors to anticipate as he writes. It is required of him that he plan his story carefully, and that at the outset he know the end and
the steps to
it.
everything I should know?
He must explain enough, and not

has, for the
too much.
this,
He
accomplishment
of
various resources, dependent in large part

his point of view.
upon
The more
restricted the
point of view, the more difficult will be the
man-
agement
of
the exposition.
Exposition must
not, last of
all,
be presented in too large and un-
assimilable lumps.
For the reader

of the plot.
may
then be
bored and skip, thus missing points essential to
an understanding
CHAPTER
VI
INTRODUCTIONS. THE ORDER OF
NARRATION
How
it is
should a story begin?
It
is
a question
to be answered afresh with every story, and, as
important,
we must
discuss it with
some
particularity.
Certain
it is
that a story should
begin so attractively that the reader will be
obligation to read,
tempted to go further with it, for he is under no and must be seduced into
so.
doing
The problem of the introduction is complicated by the necessity for exposition.* This, if given by the author in his own words, is often heavy,
and, though necessary to a clear understanding
of the story, is in itself uninteresting.
writers, therefore, get
Many
done with
it
at the outset.
Yet, in such a case, what shall immediately suc-
ceed the
So, too,
initial exposition
if
remains undetermined.
of the open-
the exposition be thoroughly dissolved
in action
and dialogue, the nature

still
ing scene must
be decided upon.
06
What,
*See chapter V, "Exposition and Preparation."
INTRODUCTIONS
ness, should guide the writer to a choice of effective opening?
97
aside from the general principle of attractive-
an
The
whole.
practice of
many
writers
is
to begin the
story in a
manner
characteristic of the story as a

all
story should be highly unified, be
of a piece.
Therefore
it
should strike
certainty.
its
note
at the outset,
and with
story of
adventurous action
dialogue,
analysis,
may
well begin with the nar-
ration of an incident;
one of character, with

a
or personal description;
story concerned with background or setting
may
open descriptively; one of idea

there
is
may begin with a
Of course no obligation that the writer observe Merely it is advisable that he these practices. have them in mind as a possible means of effecting his purpose, which is to devise an opening characteristic of, and in harmony with, his story
generalization or a bit of philosophy.
as a whole.
Yet, though a story should begin both characteristically
and
interestingly, caution
is
here
in-
needed.
The
meretricious
author
begins
vitingly with a brisk
show
of action, or lively
significant
characterization
and dialogue,
still
we
hope, of something
that something
is
better to come.
And
never realized. This is a most and the reader so tricked will never forget nor forgive. I remember once,
irritating thing,
98

tackling a novel
when a boy,
Yonge.
by Charlotte M.
I
In the opening pages there was a brave
glitter of action
and knightly adventure, and
thought I had unearthed a treasure.

I detected
After a bit
something ominous, and, my suspicions
aroused, I turned deliberately to the last pages,

to
do which was not
my
usual practice.
There,
indeed, the trickery of the book lay revealed:
he entered a monastery, and she a nunnery.
Who she was
I never
knew, nor have
I ever since
read a page of Miss Yonge's edifying works.
In the literary shop the wise dealer labels his
you do not want them, you may leave them; he will not attempt to sell you a garment half cotton in the guise of wool, for you
goods.
If
will discover the deception to his cost.
But
if
he
is
honest you
may
buy, even though his stock

indifferent.
be scant, and the quahty
Honesty
and good intent go

of brains.
far to reconcile us to a lack
The danger
tion leads
latent in the glittering introduc-
The
story
many writers to proceed cautiously. may be replete with fascinating in-
cident and its first pages be far from diverting. Those readers who persevere then congratulate themselves as the going becomes easier, and the writer, by contrast with his dulness at the outset, seems astonishingly bright. The danger, however, is that the reader will never persevere.
INTRODUCTIONS
Most
of us,
99
nowadays, have lost the habit of reading a book from cover to cover as a moral
exercise.
or
Our interest must be aroused and held we will have none of it. The shorter the story,
In a novel,
as, for
the truer this generalization.
example, one of Scott's, I can get pleasure by
dropping whole paragraphs, and pages here and

there
picking the plums out

short story,
of
it,
so to speak.
built, canis
But the
lose
more compactly
not be so treated, for to omit a page
to
something vital to the
intelligibility of the
action.
Before the citation of typical story openings
perhaps a word should be said of the story which

begins with a bit of philosophy expressive of the
story theme, or a story
is
comment upon
if
hfe which the
designed to illustrate.
the story
is
This has the

genuinely
illus-
virtue of frankness
trative of the philosophy,

it;
and not irrelevant

is
to
or of
is
or
of course, that the reader
his
The danger is, who prefers to draw own moral and make his own inferences will
seriousness.
humor if made in mock
the generalization
absurd
be uncomfortable in the presence of abstract Most of truths, and withdraw from the story.
us object on principle to moralizing, and prefer
the
story
only.
The
writer
may, however,
moralize so cleverly as to justify the method.
Kipling
is
highly successful here, and in
many
of
loo

by
method.
Poe, too, whose themes are often
his earlier stories succeeds in interesting us

this
interesting chiefly
by reason
of the underlying
idea, often generalizes to advantage.
few examples of story openings are cited:
Denis de Beaulieu was not yet two-and- twenty, but he counted himself a grown man, and a very accomplished cavalier into the bargain. Lads were early formed in that rough, warfaring epoch; and when one has been in a pitched battle and a dozen raids, has killed one's man in an honorable fashion and knows a thing or two of strategy and mankind, a certain swagger in the gait is surely to be pardoned. He had put up his horse with due care, and supped with due deliberation; and then, in a very agreeable frame of mind, went out to pay a visit in the gray of the evenIt was not a very wise proceeding on the ing. young man's part. He would have done better to remain beside the fire or go decently to bed. For the town was full of the troops of Burgundy and England under a mixed command; and though Denis was there on safe-conduct, his safe-conduct was like to serve him little on a chance encounter. It was September, 1429; the weather had fallen sharp; a flighty piping wind, laden with showers, beat about the township; and the dead leaves ran riot along the streets. Here and there a window was already lighted up; and the noise of men-at-arms making merry over supper within, came forth in fits and was swallowed up
INTRODUCTIONS
and carried away by the wind,
swiftly;
\\i
\J loi
/h^ n^^t j[elj the flag of England, fluttering on the' spire top, grew ever fainter and fainter against the flying clouds a black speck like a swallow in the tumultuous, leaden chaos of the sky. As the night fell the wind rose, and began to hoot under the archways and roar amid the tree-tops in the valley below the town. (Stevenson, The Sire de Maletroit^s Door)
Here exposition and description of place

of adventure. It
is
set
forth briefly the conditions essential to a story

night, the scene a city filled
with unseen dangers.
That
it is
autumn
is
en-
hances the mystery of the dark houses, which

shut out the sharp wind.
soldier,
The hero
a young
well fitted,
in
the warlike epoch de-
scribed, to be the centre of stirring adventure.
''But
for so
if it
"Lord
of
my life,
be a girl?" it cannot be.

nights,
I have prayed
gifts to
many
and sent
Sheikh
Badl's shrine so often, that I know God will give us a son a man-child that shall grow into a
Think of this and be glad. My mother shall be his mother till I can take him again, and the mullah of the Pattan mosque shall cast his nativity God send he be born in an auspicious hour! and then, and then thou wilt never weary of me, thy slave."
man.
"Since when hast thou been a slave, my queen?" "Since the beginning till this mercy came
i02
vARlj QF
THE SHORT STORY
rtpoDie.; iHpW'fpuM I be sure of thy love when I 'knew tha I had been bought with silver?" "Nay, that was the dowry. I paid it to thy mother." "And she has buried it, and sits upon it all
like a hen. What talk is yours of I was bought as though I had been a Lucknow dancing-girl instead of a child."
day long
dower!
"Art thou sorry for the sale?" "I have sorrowed; but to-day I Thou wilt never cease to love me now?
my
king?
"
answer,
am
glad.
"Never
never.
No."
"Not even though the mem-log the white women of thy own blood love thee? And re-
I have watched them driving in the evening; they are very fair." "I have seen fire-balloons by the hundred. I have seen the moon, and then I saw no more
member,
fire-balloons."
Ameera clapped her hands and laughed. "Very good talk," she said. Then with an assumption
Thou
wilt."
hast
"it is enough. permission to depart if thou (Kipling, Without Benefit of Clergy.)

of great stateliness:
my
The
story here indicated
is
one essentially
domestic, though with an atmosphere of unconventionality and strangeness.

tragic in its
That
denouement
is,
as I
it is to be have remarked
in another place, sufficiently manifest.
military friend of mine, who died of a fever in Greece a few êars ago, told me one day about
INTRODUCTIONS
103
the first action in which he took part. His story made such an impression on me that I wrote it down from memory as soon as I had Here it is: time. I joined the regiment on the fourth of SeptemI found the colonel in camp. ber, in the evening. He received me rather roughly; but when he
had read General B 's recommendation, his manner changed and he said a few courteous words to me. I was presented by him to my captain, who had just returned from a reconnaissance. This captain, with whom I hardly had time to become acquainted, was a tall, dark man, with a harsh, repellent face. He had been a private and had won his epaulets and cross on the battle-field. His voice, which was hoarse and weak, contrasted
strangely with his almost gigantic stature. I was told that he owed that peculiar voice to a bullet which had passed through his lungs at
the battle of Jena. When he had learned that I was fresh from the school at Fontainebleau, he made a wry
and said: *'My lieutenant died yesterday." I understood that he meant to imply: ''You ought to take his place, and you are not capable
face
of it."
(Merimee,
story
is
The Taking of
the Redoubt.)
The The
thus set forth unmistakably as a
tale of warfare,
first
with stirring action promised.

is
paragraph
purely superfluous.
feel it
An
author of to-day would not
necessary to
I04

how
the tale
explain
came
to be.
The pretence
of plausibility is too thin,
and adds nothing.
The Nellie, a cruising yawl, swung to her anchor without a flutter of the sails, and was at The flood had made, the river was nearly rest. calm, and being bound down the river, the only thing for it was to come to and wait for the turn
of the tide.
The
sea-reach of the
Thames
stretched before
us like the beginning of an interminable waterway. In the ofiing the sea and the sky were welded together without a joint, and in the luminous space the tanned sails of the barges drifting up with the tide seemed to stand still in red clusters of canvas sharply peaked, with gleams of varnished sprits. A haze rested on the low shores that ran out to sea in vanishing flatThe air was dark above Gravesend, and ness. farther back still seemed condensed into a mournful gloom, brooding motionless over the
biggest,
. .
.
and the
greatest,
town on
earth.
The day was ending in a serenity of still and exquisite brilliance. The water shone pacifically; the sky, without a speck, was a benign immensity of unstained light; the very mist on the Essex marshes was like a gauzy and radiant fabric, hung from the wooded rises inland, and draping the low shores in diaphanous folds. Only the gloom to the west, brooding over the upper reaches, became more sombre every minute, as if angered by the approach of the sun. And at last, in its curved and imperceptible fall, the sun sank low, and from glowing white

INTRODUCTIONS
105
changed to a dull red without rays and without heat, as if about to go out suddenly, stricken to death by the touch of that gloom brooding over a crowd of men. Forthwith a change came over the waters, and the serenity became less brilliant but more profound. The old river in its broad reach
rested unruffled at the decline of day, after ages of good service done to the race that peopled its banks, spread out in the tranquil dignity of a
waterway leading
earth.
to the uttermost ends of the looked at the venerable stream not in the vivid flush of a short day that comes and departs forever, but in the august light of abiding memories. And indeed nothing is easier for a man who has, as the phrase goes,*' followed the sea" with reverence and affection, than to evoke the great spirit of the past upon the lower reaches of the Thames. The tidal current runs to and fro in its unceasing service, crowded with memories of men and ships it had borne to the rest It had of home or to the battles of the seas. known and served all the men of whom the nation is proud, from Sir Francis Drake to Sir John Franklin, knights all, titled and untitled the great knights-errant of the sea. It had borne
We
all the ships whose names are like jewels flashing in the night of time, from the Golden Hind returning with her round flanks full of treasure, to be visited by the Queen's Highness and thus pass out of the gigantic tale, to the Erebus and and that Terror, bound on other conquests never returned. It had known the ships and
the meii.
They had
sailed
from Deptford, from

io6
Greenwich, from Erith the adventurers and King's ships and the ships of the men on 'Change; captains, admirals, the dark ''interlopers" of the Eastern trade, and the commissioned "generals" of East India fleets. Hunters of gold or pursuers of fame, they had all gone out on that stream, bearing the sword, and often the torch, messengers of the might within the land, bearers of a spark from the sacred fire. What greatness had not floated on the ebb of that river into the mystery of an unthe settlers;
known
of
The dreams of men, the seed earth! commonwealths, the germs of empires. The sun set; the dusk fell on the stream, and The lights began to appear along the shore.
.
Chapman
moved
in
light-house, a three-legged thing erect
on a mud-fiat, shone
Lights of ships great stir of lights going up and down. And farther west on the upper reaches the place of the monstrous town was still marked ominously on the sky, a brooding gloom in sunshine, a lurid glare under the
strongly.
the fairway
stars.
''And this also," said Marlow suddenly, "has been one of the dark places of the earth."
Romans
ago
river
like
"I was thinking first came
of
very old times, when the
Light came out the other day. sinceyou say Knights? Yes; but a a running blaze on a
.
here, nineteen
. .
hundred years
of this
it is
plain, like
flash of
may
live in the flicker lightning in the clouds. it last as long as the old earth keeps rolling!
We

INTRODUCTIONS
But darkness was here yesterday. Imagine feelings of a commander of a fine what d'ye
107
the
call
'em? trireme in the Mediterranean, ordered suddenly to the north; run overland across the Gauls in a hurry; put in charge of one of these craft the legionaries a wonderful lot of handy men they must have been too used to build, apparently by the hundred, in a month or two, if we may believe what we read. Imagine him here the very end of the world, a sea the color of lead, a sky the color of smoke, a kind of ship about as rigid as a concertina and going up this river with stores, or orders, or what you like. Sandbanks, marshes, forests, savages, precious Httle to eat fit for a civilized man, nothing but Thames water to drink. No Falernian wine here, no going ashore. Here and there a military camp lost in a wilderness, like a needle in a bundle
hay cold, fog, tempests, disease, exile, and death, death skulking in the air, in the water, in the bush. They must have been dying like flies here. Land in a swamp, march through the woods, and in some inland post feel the savagery, the utter savagery, had closed around him, all that mysterious life of the wilderness that stirs in the forest, in the jungles, in the hearts of wild men. There's no initiation either into such mysteries. He has to live in the midst of the incomprehensible, which is also detestable. And it has a fascination, too, that goes to work upon him. The fascination of the abomination you know. Imagine the growing regrets, the longing to escape, the powerless disgust, the surrender, the hate." (Conrad, Heart of Darkness.)
of
.
io8

it is true,
This story,
has no connection with

civilized country,
England save as England, a

contrasts with the Congo.
The
is
story has to do
with that contrast and
largely descriptive.
in
The The
like
introduction
story
is,
is,
therefore,
character.
moreover, long, though structurally

its
a short story, and
introduction
is
in pro-
portion.
This type of story, that concerned with background primarily, is rather rare in English literature, and appropriate illustrations are conse.
quently few.
Descriptive story openings of a
purely conventional sort are, of course,
common
enough.
The mental
of analysis.
elBFects.
lytical, are, in
We
features discoursed of as the anathemselves, but little susceptible appreciate them only in their know of them, among other things,
We
that they are always to their possessor, when inordinately possessed, a source of the liveliest enjoyment. As the strong man exults in his physical ability, delighting in such exercises as call his muscles into action, so glories the analyst in that moral activity which disentangles. He derives pleasure from even the most trivial occupations bringing his talent into play. He is fond of enigmas, of conundrums, of hieroglyphics; exhibiting in his solutions of each a degree of acumen which appears to the
.
sults,
ordinary apprehension praeternatural. His rebrought about by the very soul and es-
INTRODUCTIONS
109
sence of method, have, in truth, the whole air (Poe, The Murders in the Rtie of intuition.
Morgue.)
This
story
is
but the
first
paragraph of Poe's story.

in a
There follow several

itself,
more
Uke
strain.
is
The
though exciting enough,
chiefly
interesting to the author for its underlying idea.
Hence
his long analytical introduction
too long
is
perhaps for
many
readers.
Kipling's handling of the

illustrated in this
same method
well
from Thrown Away:
To
into
''sheltered life
boy under what parents call the system" is, if the boy must go the world and fend for himself, not wise.
rear a
Unless he be one in a thousand he has to pass through many unnecessary troubles; and may, possibly, come to extreme grief simply from ignorance of the proper proportions of things. Let a puppy eat the soap in the bath-room or chew a newly-blacked boot. He chews and chuckles until, by and by, he finds out that blacking and Old Brown Windsor make him very sick; so he argues that soap and boots are not wholesome. Any old dog about the house will soon show him the unwisdom of biting big dogs' ears. Being young, he remembers, and goes abroad, at six months, a well mannered little beast with a chastened appetite. If he had been kept away from boots, and soap, and big dogs till he came to the trinity full-grown and with developed teeth, just consider how fearfully sick
no
and thrashed he would be! Apply that notion to the "sheltered life" and see how it works. It does not sound pretty, but it is the better of two evils. There was a Boy once who had been brought up under the "sheltered life" theory; and the (KJpling, Thrown theory killed him dead. . Away.)
. .
The passage
is
illustrative of Kipling's so-
called journaHstic
method, which he employs

It
is,
often in his earlier stories.

to
in brief, this:
announce at the outset the story theme, its The essential fact, and then to elaborate it. method resembles that of the newspaper "story" in so far as a newspaper seeks to give the essence of the news in the first paragraph, and to expand
or
retell
this
in
succeeding
paragraphs.
Of
so
course the writer does not give his story

far that it
is
away
no longer
excites our interest.
Rather
our curiosity aroused to see the development
of the
early
theme announced, as in a symphony the announcement of a motif does not detract from but rather enhances the pleasure which we
take in
its
elaboration.
then,
We
may,
it
summarize
briefly.
In the
in-
troduction the story

things:
may do
one of several
may begin
or
it
with exposition rather than
introduce this later at the risk of retarding the

story-action;
may
at
once indicate
its
INTRODUCTIONS
character (this
iii
may
be done to some extent

a story of action,
a story of
even in exposition) by beginning in a fashion/N

characteristic of the theme:
if
with action;
alysis,
if
of character,
with dialogue, anif
or personal description;
place, with description;
or
if
concerned with an
abstract idea, with a generalization.
There
is
no
rule other
than
this:
a good writer indicates
as soon as he can, the kind of story
which he
has to
tell.
The Order of Narration

In our second chapter, that upon the logic of
narrative,
it
was assumed that a story
follows a
is
strictly chronological order.
In general this
true;
by
far the greater part of stories
pursue
the temporal order.
In a novel which involves
several groups of characters not intimately re-
lated throughout, the writer sometimes finds
it
necessary to double back for the purpose of

bringing
up the rear-guard
of his story.
Thus
in the novels of Dickens,
Thackeray, and Scott,
the several stories are carried singly over a period

of time.
This method need not
much
concern
us here, however, for the action of a short story
must, of necessity, concern

characters,
itself
with but a few
and
for this reason there is little
justification for
interest.
more than a
single centre of
Nevertheless, an occasional deviation
112

is
from the time order

which, by
cellent.
to
be found in stories
common
consent, are regarded as ex-
The
reasons for such exceptions
we
should note.
In Kipling's The
Man Who Would Be
King
lay
the initial incidents explain the author's meeting
with the chief characters of the story,

their plans to enter Kafirstan their enterprise.
who
and depart upon

tell
Several years elapse before the
survivor of the expedition returns to

story of the intervening period.
the
This deviation
is
from the
indeed,
strict
order of chronology
but
slight;
all
the story's action to the point of the
survivor's narrative
may
be regarded as intro-
ductory merely, an introduction designed to

give verisimihtude to an otherwise incredible
yam.
Exposition of events precedent to the
story's action,
and introduced
is
after the action
has been begun,
analogous to this instance.*
Interest once aroused, the exposition

to antecedent circumstances.
Interest, effectiveness
may
turn
these are the

from the
sole jus-
tification for a deviation
strict
order
ot time.
Notable
stories there are
which violate
this precept,
effective.
and which are yet both clear and Such a one is Balzac's La Grande
this,
Breteche.
In
the story proper begins with
the death of the principal character, after which

* See chapter V, " Exposition
and Preparation."
INTRODUCTIONS
we have
113
the beginning and the succeeding action.
Balzac's purpose in departing from the time
order was doubtless threefold.
He
wished to
include the effective death-bed scene with which
the story opens.
Yet
this in the order of occur-
rence comes at a considerable interval from the
events which determine
it.
To
bridge this time-
gap would be difficult. Also, in the inverted order, the most striking scene is reserved for the end
of the story.
third reason
is
the point of
view adopted.
Balzac endeavors to give his
story plausibility
by presenting a mass
of cir-
cumstantial evidence concerning the methods
by
which he arrived at the story. He gets it piecemeal, and only after considerable effort. Not only is the reader's curiosity whetted thereby,
but he
is
prepared to accept the story as true,

is in.
for the order of incident
accord with the
method by which the author learned the story. On the other hand, the point of view and the
circumstantial evidence
make
the story consider-
ably longer than
it
need otherwise be, and,

effect-
granted the ability of a Balzac, no more

ive,
we must
believe, than
if
the time order had
been followed, and the death-bed scene either brought close to the events preceding or omitted
altogether.
It is not because of the violation
of the time order,
but despite
it,
that
La Grande
Breteche
is
a powerful story.
114

End
of the Tether, like-
Conrad's story, The

incident
wise departs from the time order so that the initial
may be brought closer to

is
the climax,
and
the time covered thus be reduced.

doubtful.
If
But
here the gain
the reader desires
an instance
in
which confusion clearly follows
upon such a
entitled
deviation, he may find it in a story The Denver Express* by A. A. Hayes. Other instances less well known may be readily
found.
We may
writer,
order,
then generalize to this extent: The when tempted to depart from the time should make certain that he has cogent
reasons therefor; he should exhaust his technical

resources before he permits himself the liberty,
assuring himself that
by no device can he
with equal
it
tell
his story in chronological order

If
effect.
he does depart from
he must be doubly
is
careful that the time relation of events

fectly clear to the reader.
per-
* Published in a series entitled, "Short Story Classics" (American), by P. F. Collier and Son.
CHAPTER
VII
CHARACTER-DRAWING
Turgenieff,
In a prefatory essay to an English edition of Henry James relates the Russian novelist's practice of composing an elaborate biography for each of his story characters. Very little of these biographies need appear in the story itself; their purpose was to acquaint the author with his own creations, so that, knowing
them intimately, he was enabled to set them fortli in natural and individual action when the story demanded. Of Ibsen much the same is told. He knew, it appears, more concerning his characters than his plays revealed; they were to him
real people.
The advantages
by
of so thorough-
going a method are apparent.
Characters fully
and
clearly reahzed
the author are sure to be

if
convincing to the reader
the author
is
a com-
petent craftsman, one able to

reveal themselves.
make
his people
Yet these
are, doubtless, ex-
treme instances of literary thoroughness;

majority of writers are not so painstaking.
the most they
the
At
may have imagined
their creations
ii6

More
often, I fancy, the peo-
so vividly that they could invent sound biog-
raphies at need.
ple of the story, nebulously conceived,

definiteness as the author writes.
grow into
is,
Characters should be convincing; that
they
should breathe the air of hfe, and be recognizable as individuals,
however small
their part in
the action; but
it
does not follow that they need
be elaborately conceived. In many stories character is of quite minor importance; action, or
even the background before which the characters move, may be chief. To Turgenieff character revelation
was usually the object

this is
of the story,
and
he devised the action to express the characters.
For many authors

aim.
not the method nor
The
writer
it
may
wish to subordinate char-
acter lest
interest.
intrude unduly upon the reader's

in the story of adventure the
Thus
reader cares only that the hero be brave and resourceful,
and the heroine pretty and
alluring.
These are the conventional pieces of the game.

Certain variations are, of course, possible, and
the clever writer contrives to trick out his stock
characters with a semblance of freshness.
in reality they are scarcely
tions,
But more than convenand the reader asks nothing more pro-
vided the action be sufficiently absorbing.
Stevenson writes of Treasure Island that he

deliberately
made
his pirates not realistic
and
CHARACTER-DRAWING
true persons, but pirates as a
breed,
fierce
11
boy conceives the

with wide
mustachioed
fellows,
trousers
and
belts full of pistols.

is
In Treasure
Island character
not the objective.

the rest
Provided
the buccaneers walk and fight with sufficient
swagger,
it is
enough;
is
soul-stirring
adventure.
Less skilful writers think nothing
of checking the flow of action to bore
and
dis-
concert the reader with analysis of motive or
with irrelevant comment.

recall stories in
Every reader will which the author has endeavored
to do too many things, to tell exciting incident, and to analyze character as well. And because^
the story purpose

terest is divided,
is
uncertain the reader's inhis reaction not pleasure

irritation, the feeling
and
but a confused sense of

that something
is
wrong somewhere.
if
Character
should then be subordinated
the story deals
mainly with action.

stract idea or
is
If the story is
one of ab-
concerned mostly with setting,
Thus
an equal subordination of character is essential. in Hawthorne's short stories the reader
perceives often that the characters are but personified ideas,
and
their
purpose nothing more
than the revelation of the author's philosophy.
The reference to Hawthorne serves to open up another aspect of a complex problem. His
characters,
we
say,
are often but personified
ideas, possessed of little vitality
and uncolored
ii8

life.
with the hues of
By
of all
this
we mean merely
that the characters are not untrue, but that they
have been stripped

one principle,
but the one or few
qualities essential to the author's purpose.

.
The
For and
selection, here, as in
every division
iôf
our subject, has again been invoked.
consider the complexity of

realize
human
character,
how
little of it
an author can
set forth in
a few pages.
We
applaud a novel which de-
lineates one, or at the
most
several, characters
with something of the complexity

life.
we behold
is
in
And
seeming.
but In a short narrative the problem is

here, even,
the resemblance
yet more formidable, the selection more exacting.
How,
then,
there to guide
first free his
I
must the writer select; what is him in his difficulty? He must
characters of contradictory quaHties;
they must not be inconsistent.

'
Now,
for,
it is
notori-
ous that in real

inconsistency.
fife
people do act with apparent

could
say apparent,
explicable.
we
know them
edge
is
sufficiently well, the inconsistencies
might be perfectly
impossible.
But
this
knowl-
A man may
in the
morning
do one thing, and in the afternoon, because of some subtle influence of the weather or his In a story he digestion, do the exact opposite. must not so act unless the contradictory action is satisfactorily explained, and this explanation
is
seldom possible by reason of space limitations.
CHARACTER-DRAWING
The writer is forced
able, logical,
19
to
make his
creations reason-
and in the main dependable. He may, of course, draw an inconsistent character, but the inconsistencies must then be expected,
be in themselves
to
reliable.
It is not permissible
in all things,
draw a character consistent
and
then at a crucial
moment
force that character to
do the unexpected. A story in this respect In life we expect indiffers widely from life.
consistency;
elimination.
in
It
is
a story we depend upon its a hard lesson for the young
writer to learn, for he has his eye
upon some one
he knows
who has
revealed the very contra-
dictory qualities which he selects.
He knows
"This
is
life
many an
life,"
instance of the inexplicable.
says he; ''and should I not write of
as I
know
it?"
To
this there is
answer: a story
is art,
and
art
is
not
but the one life but a
rationalized semblance of
life.
a whole must be rational,

characters be
logical, so
As the story as must the
who
constitute that story.
Let us assume that the young writer has

grasped this distinction and has given
tative acceptance.
to his selection
it
is
a tenthere
What
the
further guide
among
many
characteristics
which human nature reveals to him? Here his purpose in the story is the determining factor
in the selection.
If,
as
we have
seen, his pur-
pose
is
to tell a story of action, his choice will lie
I20

heroism, cowarddeceit, perseverance,
is
among the universal qualities of

ice,
'^purpose
to
and the like. If his bring out an idea, his characters

all
may
sary
be stripped of
traits.
other than the few neces-
Thus, in Hawthorne we have a
man
dominated by the single purpose to remove from The man is not his wife's beauty its one blot. deterred from the human; in life he would be accomplishment of his desire by love and pity and kindred affections. In the story he must not
be so complex, but must proceed unswervingly Again, in as though possessed of the one idea.
Poe's The Cask of Amontillado the chief character is but a personified quahty, the desire for
revenge.
not
Were he too complex, the story could move with its swift certainty to the goal
well ask
sought.
We may
how
far this simplification
through selection
personified virtues
may
be carried.
In certain
old-fashioned moral tales the characters are but
and vices, abstractions merely.

feel
These,
it will
be objected, are uninteresting and

In Pilgrim's Progress we
faint
untrue to
life.
that Christian and Greatheart and Mr. Worldly
Wiseman bear but a

people.
semblance to
real
And
they are uninteresting by reason
of this remoteness.
for
us.
In Hawthorne, too, we ask

reasonable.
more truth
to reality than the author grants

is
The
objection
The check
CHARACTER-DRAWING
is
121 too
always
life.
If the simplified character is

it fails
far
removed from reaUty

life.
of its intended
is
illusory effect, for,
though the story
not
life, it
must resemble
The more
universal
the
quality or qualities selected,
the greater the
chance of the reader's acceptance of them.

will
He
un-
from
his
own
imagination supply the minor

If the quality is
characteristics necessary.
usual for one so dominant, the greater the need

of
humanizing
it
by the addition
of
one or more
simple characteristics less exceptional.

of the story
and the
writer's grasp of life
The aim must
both aid in determining the character

If character
selection.
be the aim of the story, the writer

will permit.
may
be as complex as space
In a
novel the complexity may, therefore, be

greater than in a short narrative.
ciple of selection,
much
But
the prin-
none the less active, and the writer is well prompted if he limits his characters rather more than at first thought he deems necessary. By so doing he will gain both in intensity and contrast. If
though
less exacting, is
the analysis
ried,
is
too minute, the qualities too va-
the reader
fail
may easily become lost in a maze

it is
and
to appreciate at its proper value the
particular psychological knot
the writer's
purpose to untangle.
It
is
for this reason
the necessity of character
appearing logical and representative, and yet
122

that the writer
is
not overcomplex
spired
if
well
in-
he conceives his characters imaginathan attempts to draw them directly

originals.
is,
tively rather
from human
of realistic fiction
Much of the weakness am convinced, due to the

imaginaset
failure of writers to create characters

tively.
Rather do they attempt to
down,
unmodified, persons they have seen and known.
The
complexities
and
inconsistencies of these
real people stand in the
way
of a compelling
picture,
ness.
and the
result is a lack of convincing-
To
what, then,
may
the writer turn?
To
his
knowledge of life first of all, which is derived from two sources, observation of others and of himself. He should be introspective, knowing
the springs of his
own
conduct.
all
Proceeding,
then, on the assumption that

tentially,
people are, po-
much
alike,
he interprets the actions
of others, supplying motives
from
his
own
self-
knowledge.
tion
Though he bases his geêraHzaupon Kfe and observes as widely and as sympathetically as he can, this is his method of work throughout. A knowledge of Hfe based upon observation and interpreted in the Hght of self-analysis is, then, the stuff from which the writer moulds his imaginary characters. Thus conceived they are plastic, subservient to his purpose, and con-
CHARACTER-DRAWING
sistent with the story
1 23
he has to
tell.
Nor
is
there
any lack
of range in this
method.
A man
in the
sum
in
of his attributes represents all pos-
sible types.
It
is
true that in his neighbor the
qualities
differ
their
his
proportions
and emphasis
from
own;
yet he imderstands his
ineighbor as he sees imaginatively the difference

in himself,
acteristics
were certain of
his
dominant charall,
suppressed and others emphasized.

the
as
Though
various
the elements are the same in
combinations are almost
infinite,
from oxygen, nitrogen, and carbon, in varying proportions, is formed a vast series of com-
pounds individual and
distinct.
A
his
writer cannot get
away from
it
himself and
view of the world.
Doubtless the world

to be. It is
all differences, all
isn't really
what he imagines
all
something more, the sum of

personalities,
points of view
these
appre-
hended by no
perforce,
single man. The writer must, work with what he knows, striving
always to increase the range of his understanding
by a
cultivation of insight through the im-
agination.
in his
What he
discovers he
if
may
he
is
set forth
imagined creations, which,
sane and
wholesome and broad-minded,
will
be
sufficiently
life
what others regard as arouse interest and pleasure.

true to
less to discuss
typical of
to
It will be profit-
the matter at greater length.
An
124

come
readily to some;
appreciation of the justness of this point of view

will
it, if
others will arrive at
ever, only
by
practice in story writing,
by
experiencing the difficulty of character creation
by any other method. Let us turn to the more technical aspects of our problem, the means by which characters imaginatively and artistically conceived for the purposes of the story may most effectively be portrayed. The means are: analysis, a record of the effects of character upon the other persons of the story, action, speech, and personal description. We must consider these separately and in order. Analysis may be of two sorts, that in the person of the author, and that of the characters by themselves; this last, for the most part, in stories
written from the point of view of the actornarrator.
less.
Of the
first
the illustrations are end-
Any good
passages
of
short story written from the
point of view of the author-omniscient will contain

analysis.
The
Lear of
following
is
from Turgenieff's story

a longish
tale,
the Steppes,
to be sure,
and
of a leisurely
method:
And yet even this self-confident unflinching giant had his moments of melancholy and depression.
Without any visible cause he would suddenly begin to be sad; he would lock him-
CHARACTER-DRAWING
humlike
call his
self
125
up alone
in his room,
and
humpositively
or he would page Maximka, and tell him to read aloud to him out of the solitary book which had somehow found its way into his house, an odd copy of Novikovsky's, The Worker at Leisure, or else
to sing to him.
a whole hive of bees;
And Maximka, who by some
strange freak of chance could spell out print, syllable by syllable, would set to work with the usual chopping up of the words and transference of the accent, bawling out phrases of the following description: ''But man in his wilfulness draws from this empty h3ôthesis, which he applies to the animal kingdom, utterly opposite conclusions. Every animal separately," he says, "is not capable of making me happy!" and so on. Or he would chant in a shrill little voice a mournful song, of which nothing could be distinguished but: ''Ee eee ee a ee a ee Aaa ska O ... 00 ... 00 bee ee ee ee la!" While Martin Petrovitch would shake his head, make allusions to the mutabiHty of hfe, how all things turn to ashes, fade away like grass, pass and will return no more! picture had somehow come into his hands, representing a burning candle, which the winds, with puffed-out cheeks,
. .
.
were blowing upon from

the inscription:
all
sides;
below was
the life of man." He was very fond of this picture; he had hung it up in his own room, but at ordinary, not melancholy, times he used to keep it turned face to the wall, so that it might not depress him. Harlov, that colossus, was afraid of death! To the con-
"Such
is
126

of
religion,
solations
to
prayer,
however, he
rarely
had recourse
in his fits of melancholy.
Even then he
gence.
chiefly reHed
on
his
own
intelli-
particular reUgious feeling; he was not often seen in church; he used to say, it is true, that he did not go on the ground that,
He had no
owing to
pression
his corporeal dimensions,
he was afraid
fit
of squeezing other people out.
The
of de-
commonly ended
in
Martin Petro-
and suddenly, in a voice of thunder, ordering out his droshky, and dashing off about the neighborhood, vigorously brandishing his disengaged hand over the peak of his cap, as though he would say, '^For all that I don't care a straw!" He was a regular Russian.
vitch's beginning to whistle,
The method
is
simple
generalization or
two based upon the author's knowledge of the character, and typical illustrations of the traits
so given.
The introductory paragraph

will serve as
of Stevenson's
Story of the Physician and the Saratoga Trunk
an example of a generahzed char-
acterization
is,
more
tersely done.
The
character
as the
of course, revealed
somewhat further
it is
story progresses, but as
a story of action,
character at no time plays a very important part:
Mr. Silas Q. Scuddamore was a yoimg American of a simple and harmless disposition, which was the more to his credit as he came from New
CHARACTER-DRAWING
England a
cisely
127
quarter of the New World not prefor those qualities. Although he was exceedingly rich, he kept a note of all his expenses in a little paper pocket-book; and he had chosen to study the attractions of Paris from the seventh story of what is called a furnished hotel, in the Latin Quarter. There was a great deal of habit in his penuriousness; and
famous
which was very remarkable among was principally founded upon diffidence and youth.
his virtue,
his
associates,
Characterization
by a running
analysis
of
thought and motive can be illustrated from

almost any story in the analytical manner. The method is a variant upon the summarized or generalized analysis, and the examples of it
are necessarily briefer, coming, as they do, in
the thick of action.
Maupassant's Coward
will
afford a suitable selection:
He commenced to argue with himself concerning the possibility of this thing. ''Am I afraid?" No, of course he was not afraid, as he had determined to carry the thing through, as his
mind was
fully made up to fight, and not to tremble. But he felt so profoundly troubled that he asked himself the question: *'Is it possible to be afraid in spite of one's
self?"
And that doubt, that disquietude, that dread took possession of him; if some force stronger
128
than his will, a dominating, irresistible power should conquer him, what would happen? Yes, what would happen? He certainly would go to the ground, inasmuch as he had made up his mind to go there. But suppose his hand should tremble? Suppose he should faint? And he thought of his position, of his reputation, of
his
And
name. suddenly a strange fancy seized him to
get up, in order to look in the mirror. He reHt When he saw the reflection of his face in the poHshed glass, he could hardly recognize himself, and it seemed to him he had never seen this man before. His eyes appeared enormous; and he certainly was pale yes, very pale.
his candle.
standing in front of the mirror. tongue as if to test the state of his health, and of a sudden this thought burst into his mind like a bullet: ''The day after to-morrow, at this time, I may be dead." And his heart began to beat furiously again.
He remained He put out his
Of yet
briefer bits of such characterization, a

will suffice:
chance passage
the door and went downvery slowly, thinking to himself. His past went soberly before him; he beheld it as it was, ugly and strenuous like a dream, random as chance-medley a scene of defeat. Life as he thus reviewed it, tempted him no longer; but on the further side he perceived a quiet haven for his bark. {Markheim.)
stairs
... He opened
CHARACTER-DRAWING
For the actor-narrator's analysis both
self
129
of
him-
and a second character
of the story;
I first caught sight of

still
my uncle when we
were
some yards away in one of the flying glimpses

chequered the pitch darkness of
the para-
of twilight that
the night.
pet, his
He was standing up behind
head thrown back and the bottle to his mouth. As he put it down, he saw and recognized us with a toss of one hand fleeringly above
his head.
"Has he been drinking?" shouted I to Rorie. "He will aye be drunk when the wind blaws,"
returned Rorie in the same high key, and it was all I could do to hear him. "Then was he so in February? " I enquired. Rorie's "Ay" was a cause of joy to me. The murder, then, had not sprung in cold blood from calculation; it was an act of madness no more to be condemned than to be pardoned. uncle was a dangerous madman, if you will, but he was not cruel and base as I had feared. Yet what a scene for a carouse, what an incredible vice, was this that the poor man had chosen I have always thought drunkenness a wild and almost fearful pleasure, rather demoniacal than human; but drunkenness, out here in the roaring blackness, on the edge of a cliff above that hell of waters, the man's head spinning Hke the Roost, his foot tottering on the edge of death, his ear watching for the signs of shipwreck,
My
surely that,
if it
were credible in any one, was
morally impossible in a
man
like
my
uncle,
whose mind was
set
upon a damnatory creed and
I30
{The Merry Men)

are necessary, for
principle.
haunted by the darkest superstitions. Yet so was; and as we reached the bight of shelter and could breathe again, I saw the man's eyes shining in the night with an unholy glimmer.
it
Perhaps no further illustrations of the method

it
is
sufficiently
obvious in
Self-revelation at its profoundest is
to be foimd in the soliloquies of Hamlet,
Other
of Shakespeare's plays will afford as well in-
numerable
in its
illustrations of character as revealed
ejBFect
upon
others.
his plan of ruining Othello
Thus lago declares by playing upon the
noble qualities which he perceives in the Moor.
In a story similar methods are employed.
But the
these
devices of analysis,
important as
may may
be, are less useful than action as a
means
author Action
of character revelation.
Whatever the
say of his creatures or they of them-
selves, it is
by their deeds that we judge them. we beheve to be the most genuine expres-
sion of character, particularly action in response
and passion; action, that is, truly characteristic of the man's inner self, and not
to feeling
calculated for effect.

crucial
Thus, a
man is
revealed at
are in
mannerisms abeyance, the conventional and acquired

superficial
moments, when
qualities laid aside.
It
is
in the selection of
appropriate action
by which
to reveal his crea-
CHARACTER-DRAWING
tions truly in
131
moments
of stress that the writer
must
one
exercise his greatest care.

differ Httle
man may
In trivial acts from another. On the

of
scaffold,
or in the
moment
temptation or
passion, they reveal their basic differences.

If the
author has permitted himself analysis,

it
he must, in his choice of action, see to

characters live
If
that his
up
to the roles assigned them.
he has described the hero as an admirable
character, the hero's actions

in our eyes;
if
must be admirable
is
not, the story
at cross purposes,
and serves merely

certainty of
to illustrate the
moral un-
the
author.
We
are not unac-
quainted with the type of story in which the

author, to
make a
point he deems necessary to
the development of his plot, forces a character

to
an inconsistency to achieve that end.
Yet it is not always the emotional

as these are,
in
crises
which
serve alone to reveal true character, important
and
vital as is the obligation that

fully to the parts as-
them the characters act
signed them.
trived
traits,
Character-building skilfully con-
is no sudden revelation of unsuspected but a slow process of consistent growth. is strictly
The method
position
analogous to that of exJust as every indit is,

\
and preparation.
dent
is
significant
doubly for what
and
for
what it prepares, so every action of the skilfully drawn character should serve to build for a crisis
132
in

acts,
which deeper revelations, but these consistent

be effectively and convincingly set
careful writer secures his effects
forth.
with and anticipated from the previous
may
The
subtly,
prejudicing the reader for or against this person

or that, predicting unmistakably,
though not too

It is
obviously, the roles each
must assume.
difficult to cite brief instances, for

is
the process
is
coterminous with the story, and the effect
of a
whole
sufficiently robust
though built
of
parts individually slight.

italicizing a
I shall quote a passage,
few instances by which the character

in Stevenson's story of the
of
is
Markheim,
name,
revealed to us.
The
analysis could be carried
further,
but we must content ourselves here

first
with the
for the
touches
by which we
are prepared
murder:
"Yes," said the dealer, "our windfalls are of various kinds. Some customers are ignorant, and then I touch a dividend on my superior knowledge. Some are dishonest,''^ and here he held up his candle, so that the light Jell strongly on his visitor, "and in that case," he continued, "I
profit
by my virtue." Markheim had but just entered from

and
his eyes
the day-
had not yet grown familiar with the mingled shine and darkness of the shop. At these pointed words, and before
light streets, fully
the near presence of the flame, he blinked painand looked aside.
CHARACTER-DRAWING
133
The dealer chuckled. "You come to me on Christmas day," he resumed, "when you know that I am alone in my house, put up my shutters, and make a point of refusing business. Well, you will have to pay for that; you will have to pay for my loss of time, when I should be balancing my books; you will have to pay, besides, for a kind of manner that I remark in you today
very strongly.
I
am
the essence of discretion,
no awkward questions; but when a customer cannot look me in the eye, he has to pay The dealer once more chuckled; and for it.'*
and
I ask
changing to his usual business voice, though still with a note of irony, " You can give, as usual, a clear account of how you cam^ into the possession of the object?^' he continued. "Still your uncle's cabinet? A remarkable collector,
then
sir!"
And the little pale, roimd-shouldered dealer stood almost on tiptoe, looking over the top of his gold spectacles, and nodding his head with every mark of disbelief. Markheim returned his gaze with one of infinite pity, and a touch of
horror.
"This time," said he, "you are in error. I have not come to sell, but to buy. I have no
uncle's cabinet is bare to the wainscot; even were it still intact, I have done well on the Stock Exchange, and should
curios to dispose of;
my
more
likely add to it than otherwise, and my errand today is simplicity itself. I seek a Christmas present for a lady," he continued,
waxing more fluent as he struck into the speech he had prep Sired; ''and certainly I owe you every
134
excuse for thus disturbing you upon so small a matter. But the thing was neglected yesterday;
must produce my little compliment at dinner; and, as you very well know, a rich marriage is not a thing to be neglected." There followed a pause, during which the dealer seemed to weigh this statement incredulously. The ticking of many clocks among the curious lumber of the shop, and the faint rushing of the cabs in a near thoroughfare, filled up the interval of silence. "Well, sir," said the dealer, "be it so. You are an old customer after all; and if, as you say, you have the chance of a good marriage, far be it from me to be an obstacle. Here is a nice thing for a lady now," he went on, "this handglass fifteenth century, warranted comes from a good collection, too; but I reserve the name, in the interests of my customer, who was, just like yourself, my dear sir, the nephew and sole heir of a remarkable collector." The dealer, while he thus ran on in his dry and biting voice, had stooped to take the object from its place; and as he had done so, a shock had passed through Markheim, a start both of hand and foot, a sudden leap of many tumultuous passiofis to the face. It passed as swiftly as it came, and left no trace beyond a certain trembling of the hand that now received the glass. "A glass," he said hoarsely, and then paused and repeated it more clearly. "A glass? For Christmas? Surely not?" "And why not? " cried the dealer. " Why not a glass?"
I
CHARACTER-DRAWING
Markheim was looking upon him with an
definable expression.
135
in-
''You ask
he
said.
"Why,
look here
look in look at
it
me why not?"
No! nor
I
yourself!
Do you
like to see it?
nor any man."
The little man had jumped back when Markheim had so suddenly confronted him with the mirror; but now, perceiving there was nothing worse on hand, he chuckled. "Your future lady, sir, must be pretty hard favored," said he. "I ask you," said Markheim, "for a Christmas present, and you give me this damned reminder of years, and sins and follies this hand-conscience! Did you mean it? Had you a thought in your mind? Tell me. // will he better for you if you Come, tell me about yourself. / hazard a do. guess now, that in secret you are a very charitable
man?" The dealer

It
looked closely at his companion.
was very odd, Markheim did not appear to be laughing; there was something in his face like an eager sparkle of hope, but nothing of mirth. "What are you driving at?" the dealer asked.
^^Not charitable?" returned the other gloomily. *^Not charitable; not pious; not scrupulous; unloving, unbeloved; a hand to get money, a safe Is that all? Dear God, man, is to keep it.
that all?"
"I
will tell
you what
it is,"
began the
dealer,
with some sharpness and then broke off again "But I see this is a love-match into a chuckle. of yours, and you have been drinking the lady's
health."
"Ah!"
cried
Markheim, with a
strange curi-
136
osity.

"Ah, have you been in
love?
Tell
me
about that."
"I in love! I never ''I!" cried the dealer. had the time, nor have I the time today for all Will you take the glass?" this nonsense. "Where is the hurry?" returned Markheim. "It is very pleasant to stand here talking; and life is so short and insecure that I would not hurry away from any pleasure no not even from
should rather ding, so mild a one as this. cling to what httle we can get, like a man at a
We
Every second is a cliff, if you think a mile high high enough if we fall, to dash us out of every feature of humanity. Hence it is best to talk pleasantly. Let us talk of each other; why should we wear this mask? Let us be confidential. Who knows, we might become
cliff's
edge.
upon
it
cliff
friends?''
"I have just one word

the
dealer. of
to say to you," said "Either make your purchase or
walk out "True,

fooling.
else."
my
shop."
said
true,"
Markheim.
"Enough
something
To
business.
Show
me
The dealer stooped once more, this time to replace the glass upon the shelf, his thin blond hair falKng over his eyes as he did so. Markheim
moved a httle nearer, with one hand in the pocket

he drew himself up and filled same time maîy different emotions were depicted together upon his face terror, horror, and resolve, fascination and a physical repulsion; and through a haggard lift of his upper
of his great coat;
at the
his lungs;
Up
his teeth looked out.
CHARACTER-DRAWING
"This,
dealer;
137
the
perhaps,
may
suit,"
observed
and then, as he began to rearise, Markheim bounded from behind upon his victim. The long, skewer-like dagger flashed and fell.
The
dealer struggled like a hen, striking his temple on the shelf, and then tumbled on the floor in a heap.
That Markheim
vious.
is
a rogue
who has
is
disposed
of stolen articles to the dealer
sufficiently ob-
The dealer's remark that his visitor's manner is odd arouses our attention. When Markheim gazes upon the dealer with pity and This display horror, our interest becomes keen. of emotion is an odd revelation in a rascal.
Then, in the next speech, we are aware that Markheim is lying; the dealer, too, is aware of
this.
Again,
when
the dealer stoops to find the
glass, the
mention
of
face of the purchaser puzzles us.

least,
tumultuous passions in the We know, at
that the
of excitement;
reveal,
man is wrought to a high pitch an excitement which he dare not

therefore,
is evil.
and which,
is
The
eager-
ness with which he seeks to discover good traits

in the dealer
again significant.
He
seems de-
and soon we know why. He is driven to a deed which he loathes, and at the last moment, were there a The mirror is loophole, he would withdraw. an excellent device; Markheim's terror of it and
sirous of being friends with him,
138
his

words show again the
what and soon will become. The character of Markheim grows clear before our eyes, and we anticipate his crime, for character and action are here inseparable, the revelations of emotion
fears
man who
he
is
serving to predict incident.
But have we not departed somewhat from our significant action as a means of slow character creation? Markheim's words are more Again he moves the significant than his acts. dealer, in whose suspicions we see reflected the image of Markheim himself. And, last, we have
theme:
brief descriptive touches of the
man's appearOf
the
ance, which suggest the passions within.

analysis there
is
is
scarcely a trace;
method
almost purely objective to the point of the
murder.
cant.
That
all
these
means should serve the

is signifi-
writer in the creation of his character
The
resort to
many
devices gives variety,

therefore, as
and the
skilful story-teller uses,
many
upon
as he can: analysis, action, speech, effect

others,
and description
all
may
be
illus-
trated in a single good passage, and so interrelated that they cannot be separated one from
another.
Doubtless
we
could find passages in
which one or another sufficed of itself for a time, but in the best character drawing we shall find not one but several means employed. A further
selection
will
admirably reinforce
the
point.
CHARACTERyDRAWING
This
is
139
from Turgenieff's
Tatydna Borisovna
and Her Nephew:
Tatyana Borisovna did not recognise his letters she had expected a thin and sickly man, but she beheld a broad-shouldered, stout young fellow, with a broad red face, and curly, greasy hair. The pale, slender Andriusha had been converted into sturdy Andrei
first,
At
him.
From
Ivanoff Byelovzoroff. His external appearance was not the only thing in him which had undergone a change. The sensitive shyness, the caution and neatness of former years, had been replaced by a careless swagger, by intolerable
slovenliness;
he swayed to right and
left as
he
walked, flung himself into armchairs, sprawled over the table, lolled, yawned to the full extent
and behaved impudently to his aunt and the servants, as much as to say, *'I'm an I'll show you what stuff artist, a free kazak! I'm made of!" For whole days together, he would not take brush in his hand; when the socalled inspiration came upon him, he would behave as wildly as though he were intoxicated, painfully, awkwardly, noisily; his cheeks would burn with a coarse flush, his eyes would grow inebriated; he would set to prating about his talent, his successes, of how he was developing and advancing. ... But, as a matter of fact,
of his jaws,
barely sufficed for He was an utter ignoramus, he had read nothing; and why should an artist read? Nature, freedom, poetry, those are his elements. So, shake thy curls,
it
turned out that his
gift
tolerably fair petty portraits.
I40
and chatter away volubly, and inhale Zhuk6ff with frenzy! Russian swagger is a good thing, but it is not becoming to many; and talentless second-rate Polezhaeffs are intolerable. Our
Andrei Ivanitch continued to live at his aunt's: evidently gratuitous food was to his taste. He inspired visitors with deadly ennui. He would seat himself at the piano (Tatyana Borisovna had set up a piano also) and begin to pick out with one finger ''The Dashing Troika"; he
would
strike chords and thump the keys; for hours at a stretch he would howl Varlamoff's romances "The Solitary Pine," or "No, Doctor, no, do not come," and the fat would close over his eyes, and his cheeks would shine like a drum. And then, suddenly, he would thunder: And Ta"Begone, ye tumults of passion!" tyana Borisovna would fairly jump in dismay. "'Tis extraordinary," she remarked to me one day, "what songs are composed nowadays, they are all so despairing, somehow; in my day, they used to compose a different sort: there were sad ones then too, but it was always agreeable For example: to listen to them.
.
. . .
"Come, come to me in the meadow. Where I wait for thee in vain; Come, come to me in the meadow. Where my tears flow hour after hour. Alas, thou wilt come to me in the meadow, But then 't will be too late, dear friend!"
.
Tatyana Borisovna smiled guilefully. "I shall suf-fer, I shall suf-fer," howled her nephew in the adjoining room.
CHARACTER-DRAWING
"Stop
that,
141
Andriusha!"
lan-guishing in part-ing," continued the irrepressible singer. Tatyana Borisovna shook her head. "Okh, those artists!" A year has passed since then. Byelovzoroff is still living with his aunt, and still preparing to go to Petersburg. He has become broader than he is long in the country. His aunt who
soul
is
.
.
.
"My
would have thought it? is perfectly devoted to him, and the young girls of the neighborhood
fall in
love with him.
Many of Tatyana Borisovna's former acquaintances have ceased to visit her.
In this admirable selection description

inforced with characteristic action
is re-
and speech,
are
suffi-
and the
result is a speaking likeness.
The methods
of
characterization
no further illustration. They are not to be divorced from exposition and preparation, for they serve with these the story's purposes, which involve not character portrayal only but action as well. They demand, also, description. But as description is a matter which requires separate consideration, Diathis will be taken up in another chapter. logue, too, is involved; but this, again, requires separate analysis. Let us note, however, that though for purposes of inteUigibility these elements are considered as separate problems of
ciently obvious to require
14?
ART OF THE SHOk
STORY
story-construction, they are found usually not as

free elements
but as compounds or mixtures.

his
The
once,
story-teller
and yet
unified.
must do many things all at product must be simple and Thus, in his symphony, the composer
instruments.
produces an harmonious whole from the blended

tones of
many
CHAPTER
VIII
DESCRIPTION OF PERSON AND PLACE

To personal description reference has already been made in the chapter upon characterization,
for
appearance
is
intimately associated with perof feature is
sonality,
and play
one of the keys to

If
the interpretation of emotion.

reasons, then, the writer
forth,
only for these

to set
must be able
more or
less fully as
may
suit his purpose,
the form, features, dress, and surroundings of his

creations,
in the beholder.
first
tive
and the emotions which these arouse All this is not easy. Let us consider some of the limitations of descripmethod, and then some of its possibiltiies.
chief difficulty in descriptive writing lies
The
and
in the lack of correspondence

seeing.
between writing
We
see a
man
as a whole, a group
of related parts to
be sure, but a unit which proto
duces a single and instantaneous effect upon the

observer.
Yet,
when we endeavor
enumerate
scarcely
the facts of his appearance, our
list is
more than a
fist.
The
reader
by the time he
143
144

first,
if
has grasped the last item has forgotten the
and
the parts be many,
imagination can he so
greater than the
possible,
by no exercise of the piece them together that
they will form the original.
The whole
is
indeed
if
sum
of its parts,
and should,
Yet,
if
be presented in a word.
we
employ so many as two, and say the man is a "handsome man" or an "ugly man" we have given but a faint conception of the person described. We have, indeed, drawn only upon the reader's experience of good looks in men, and
this
may be at variance with
our
own
experience.
We may
tempt
of such
note at the outset of our discussion
that the clever writer nowadays

to picture his
makes no
full
at-
character in
detail
futility
within the limits of a paragraph.
The
an endeavor should be obvious, though

it.
unskilled writers not infrequently essay
The
crafty artist, to delineate his characters swiftly
and clearly, resorts, instead, to various devices, some of which we shall consider. The first is to renounce altogether any attempt
at personal description.
difficulty
This
is
to avoid the
is
with a vengeance, and the writer

doing only as he
is
justified in so
certain that the

is
reader's visualization of characters
unimpor-
tant in the story.

If the story
Sometimes
if
this is the case.
concerns people of no marked phys-
ical peculiarities,
they are typical,
common-
DESCRIPTION
place persons such as
145
we all know, we may feel^ no need of visualizing them sharply. The story/ may be vivid without such description our concern may be with the action, or with the psy;
chology of
person
effort
the
actors.
Externally,
any one
whom
we may
visualize of our
own
without hint from the author
may serve
Or we
as well as another for the role assigned.
may make no
at
all,
attempt to visualize the character
whether individual or typical, though we
usually supply involuntarily

tion of appearance.
some dim concep-
scription
Between the total avoidance of personal deand complete portraiture lie all deI said a
grees of descriptive fulness.
moment
a single
ago
that to characterize a
man by
epithet left
much
to be desired in the
way
of
accuracy and clearness.
and individual than
to
Yet this is more specific call him merely a man.
And may
his
for the story's
purpose the single epithet

Kipling sometimes employs
often suffice.
this succinct
method.
Thus he says
the ugliest
of
one of
in ^-^^^
characters:
"He was
man
Asia with two exceptions."

indeed.
please. It
is
This compelling
exaggeration assures us that the
man was
ugly
We may
fill
in
the details
as
we
possible in a phrase to be far
more
definite
than
this,
and
to
draw a
truly individual picture.
146

little
Thus Conrad: "a

agile like
man, dry
like
a chip and
a monkey."
Again, the following from

its conte:(ft,
Balzac, which though wrenched from
shows how vivid a picture may be drawn in short space: "... a retreating forehead, a small -sL/ pointed head, and a pale face not unlike a glass Here we have a vivid and conof dirty water.''
cise picture,
the details so few that
we may
them and form a distinct and individual portrait. The method is highly selective; Balzac has merely touched upon the individualizing details. The rest we may fill in for ourselves. We collaborate with the author, and draw the picture from his suggestions. To enlist the reader's assistance is the aim of
readily assemble
the good descriptive writer,
who
proceeds on the
us,
assumption that we have, each of
a great
fund of observation memories upon which he
may
discreetly draw.
His
effort, therefore, is to
enumerate only the striking features of

acters, relying
his char-
what he does not give. It is surprising how rapid and vivid may be the pictures born of this method in the hands of a skilled writer. Conrad possesses this power to a marked degree. I quote a few of his
to supply
upon us
rapid sketches:
''He had a Roman nose, a snow-white, long beard, and his name was Mahon." **Mrs. Beard was an old woman, with a face
DESCRIPTION
all
147
wrinkled and ruddy like a winter apple, and the figure of a young girl."
One a
bit longer:
"He had a nutcracker face chin and nose coming together over a sunken mouth and it was framed in iron-gray fluffy hair that looked like a chin-strap of cotton wool sprinkled with coal-dust. And he had blue eyes in that old face ." of his, which were amazingly like a boy's.
In Carlyle's
portraiture.
letters are similar bits of vivid

is
The method
an admirable one,
but
calls for
a seeing eye, a trained sense of seof telling diction.

is
lection,
and a power
Not
always, however,
a writer content with
portraits so brief.
He may
and
wish to give his
creations at full length

tail.
in considerable de-
Inasmuch
as he can scarcely hope to

for,
do
the
this in
one elaborate study,

together,
as
we have
seen,
the reader cannot be counted on to

details
fit all
he must then introduce his description piecemeal, giving here a touch and
there a touch.
trives
From
the
first,
the reader con-
some
sort of likeness true to the original
in a single detail
the eyes, or manner of walking
perhaps.
This dim likeness becomes, with a
second
detail,
full
have a
more distinct, and at the end we and vivid picture. If the process is
can contrive a pic-
sufficiently slow, the reader
148
ture ultimately complete and exact, whereas if he were overwhelmed with details at the outset only confusion would result. Other methods to this end may, however,
sometimes be employed.
the difficulty
of Ballantrae,
Thus Stevenson meets when The Master, in The Master first appears upon the scene:
Captain Crail himself was steering, a thing not usual; by his side there sat a passenger; and the men gave way with difficulty, being hampered with near upon half a dozen portman-
But the business of teaus, great and small. landing was briskly carried through; and presently the baggage was all tumbled on shore, the boat on its return voyage to the lugger, and the passenger standing alone upon the point of rock, a tall, slender figure of a gentleman, habited in black, with a sword by his side and a walkingcane upon his wrist. The stranger turned, spied me through the mists, which were beginning to fall, and waved and cried on me to draw near. I did so with a heart like lead. "Here, my good man," said he, in the English accent, "here are some things for Durrisdeer." I was now near enough to see him, a very handsome figure and countenance, swarthy, lean, long, with a quick, alert, black look, as of one who was a fighter and accustomed to command; upon one cheek he had a mole, not unbecoming; a large diamond sparkled on his hand; his clothes, although of the one hue, were of a French
. . .
DESCRIPTION
149
and foppish design; his ruffles, which he wore longer than common, of exquisite lace; and I wondered the more to see him in such a guise, when he was but newly landed from a dirty
smuggling lugger.
This
is
true to observation.
In the distance
we
to
get but a general impression

like.
form, height,
If the
and the
As we near the figure we are able observe with more minuteness. Variants on
person
us or
this device are easily possible.
move toward
him once
we toward him,
or
if
we
see
in passing, again near at hand,
and a
like
third time face to face,
we may employ a
method, and without confusion draw a complete picture; a complete picture, however, only
method must and unessential details be In description it is the details by ignored. which the thing differs from others of its class that are sought. Men are more like one another
in a
manner
of speaking, for the
always be
selective,
than unlike.
It is the individual unlikeness
we
strive to catch;
or again,
if
they are hopelessly
commonplace, the
ness to others.
essentials of their
very hke-
The
course,
shorter the narrative the less space, of
may
the writer devote to personal deleisurely
scription.
The more
methods
of the
novehst permit longer descriptions than the short-story writer may imitate. Dickens had a
I50

work pursues
great power of elaborate and vivid description.

Turgenieff, who, even in his shorter
a leisurely
method, was
likewise highly skilled.
He
was, indeed, a master of description. The following is a quotation from his The Singers:
Behind the counter, as was proper, almost to
was standing
extent of the aperture, Nikolai Ivanitch in a gay-colored cotton shirt and with a languid smile on his plump cheeks, and
the
full
pouring out with his fat, white hands two glasses of liquor for the friends who had just entered, Blinker and the Ninny; and behind him, in the corner, near the window, his brisk-eyed wife was In the middle of the room stood to be seen. Yashka-the-Turk, a spare and well-built man of three-and-twenty years, clad in a long-tailed nankeen kaftan, blue in color. He looked like a dashing factory hand, and, apparently, could not boast of very robust health. His sunken cheeks, his large, uneasy grey eyes, his straight nose with thin, mobile nostrils, his white receding brow, with Hght chestnut curls tossed back, his his large but handsome and expressive Hps whole countenance denoted an impressionable and passionate man. He was in a state of great excitement: his eyes were winking hard, he was breathing irregularly, his hands were trembling and he really had a fever, as though with fever,
that palpitating, sudden fever which is so familiar to all people who speak or sing before an audience. Before him stood a man about forty years of age, broad-shouldered, with broad cheek-bones, and a low brow, narrow Tatar eyes, a short, thick
DESCRIPTION
nose, a square chin,
stiff
151
as bristles.
The
and shining black hajr as expression of his swarthy
and leaden-hued face, especially of his pallid lips, might have been designated as almost fierce, had it not been so composedly-meditative. He hardly stirred, and only slowly glanced around him, like an ox from beneath his yoke. He was dressed in some sort of a threadbare coat with smooth, brass buttons; an old, black silk kerHe was called the chief encircled his huge neck. Wild Gentleman.
. . .
But Turgenieff
the beginner.
is
scarcely to be imitated
by
re-
He
had, apparently,
most
markable powers of observation, a visual memory of the best, and was, as well, master of a style
which could give adequate expression to these That this vivid description is one of the gifts.
secrets of Turgenieff 's
power goes without saying.

Stevenson was of the
is
Description of persons and things need not,
however, be purely visual.
opinion that undue reliance

eye.
placed upon the
We
have, as well, the senses of hearing,
touch, smell, and taste.
Two
of these, at least,
may
be employed in personal description.
The
judge
quality of the speaking voice and of laughter are often details worth noting.
of a
And we may
if it
man by
his
hand
clasp,
be strong and
of Ballantrae,
warm, or
cold, feeble,
and clammy.
also,
The passage from The Master

previously
quoted,
reveals,
another re-
152

Dress
is
source of personal description.

nificant of
sig-
much.
Not only is it important to

it tells
the
objective picture, but

Lnd
social
much
of character
position.
In personal description,
this is of value
therefore, the writer should take care to visualize

tJhe
garb of his characters, and
if
to the story, to touch it off with

of detail he sees
fit.
whatever fulness
Neatness, foppishness, love

these
of
adornment sion demands.
all
So,
may be noted as occatoo, may attitude and bearing,

and suggest
grace or awkwardness, anything, in short, which

serves to individualize the character
social distinctions or degrees of culture.
We
should observe, too, that a room, or an
entire house
and
its
surroundings takes on to
some degree the characteristics of its inmates. The heroine's bedroom and the family library may, if well described, serve not only to make
scenes therein enacted distinct, but
may
also
contribute side-lights on character.

tures,
Books, pic-
and wall-paper, indicative of The good all important. writer may bring before us a whole class of sofurniture,
individual taste, are
ciety
by a well-chosen
If their
picture of the appurte-
nances with which his creations surround themselves.
surroundings are conventional,

taste,
whether in good or bad
we may suppose
them conventionally minded people; if individual, persons of some force of character. In
DESCRIPTION
careful
153
hands the
possibilities here of suggestive
description are endless.
Description of Place
Much
that has already been brought out in

is
personal description
scription of place,
appHcable as well to de-
latter is somewhat more complicated and difficult. Whereas the writer may, at times, avoid personal description or employ it but slightly, he may seldom evade the necessity of depicting the background for some scenes of his narrative, for if the story is
though the
to be vivid to us,
we need
to visualize the action
with some distinctness and must, therefore, have

the elements of the picture given us
writer.
by the
young
Nevertheless,
writers
it
is
safe to say that
lean
too
heavily
upon
description.
Background assumes too large a place in their eyes. Particularly are some given to descriptions of nature. But a moment's thought will reveal this practice to be a mistaken one. The
intelligent reader usually skips, or at best skims,
the nature description.
Experience has taught

superfluous.
him that
Therefore
rule:
it is it is
more often than not

well to
make
this hard-and-fast
is
never describe anything that
not
strictly
is
pertinent to the story;

necessary,
and when description
make
it
as brief as possible.
154

this precept
Yet though
writer.
be
strictly
observed
there are difficulties
enough in the path of the The conciseness imposed upon him is a

It
is
difficult thing.
far easier to write
toler-
ably clear long description than one equally The selective process clear in half the space.
becomes increasingly exacting the fewer the

words.
It
is
more
difficult to
catch the quality
of a place, unless it be unusually striking, in few words than in many. There are numerous details which may be told, and it is hard to determine which are the most truly significant. We should bear in mind, also, that senses other than that of sight play a much more important
part here than in personal description.

are often
Sounds
more
significant
than things seen, and
touch the reader more intimately
the sound of
wind in the trees,
or of running water, the wooden
cloop-cloop of horses' feet
upon the pavement,

re-
the purring of a motor-car, or a singing trolley
wire
these have individual qualities which

and
epithet.
quire nice definition
Then
there
are the odors of clover fields
and
city streets,
and
odors rightly characterized often afford the writer

his
most vivid descriptive touches. There is the the wind on the face, or the clinging wetness of snow and the sting of sleet; and on the sea one may even taste the salt breeze and the spray. The complexity of these sense appeals, to which
feel of
DESCRIPTION
the writer
155
magnifies the
must be ever
alert,
problem at the outset, though affording him also a variety of materials from which to select. The order of the presentment of these impresdifficulty of his
sions
may
not be laid
is
down
its
absolutely.
it is
If
the
scene described
an elaborate one
some-
and Sometimes it is best to begin with the more immediate impressions and lead the eye outward. Again it is more effective to begin with remoter details and then lead the eye to things near at hand. It is safest usually to trust the order in which the details come upon a good observer of the scene described. Those which he grasps first are usually the most important; then, slowly, he
times well to sketch
then to
outlines broadly
in with subordinate details.
perceives those of less significance.
As he
enters
a room from without he
first
notes, perhaps, the
change in temperature.
bare, or comfortable
Then he
It
conceives a
is
general impression of the room.
large
and
and homely,
if
light or dark.
fire
He
perceives at once
there be a
on the
hearth.
Then he
notices the character of the
furnishings, the neatness or lack of neatness of
the room, the pictures on the walls, the carpets
and rugs on the
floor.
This descriptive order,
that of impression,
visualize clearly as
demands that the writer
he writes.
156
\

may
it
Often, however, the writer
not describe
Ithe
scene as he sees
it,
but as
appears to his
/characters.
Herein Kes a great difference, for

is
the identical scene

persons.
Some
are
not the same to different more observant than others;
some are trained to observe certain things; again, all are struck by those characteristics which are most foreign to their experience, but which to those familiar with the scene pass imnoted by dint of constant repetition. And, most of all,
the scene varies with the
If I
mood
of the observer.
selects those
am
happy, joyous,
my mood
impressions of the scene about
me which
chime
the
alike
with
for
my
mood.
If I
am
sad I shall find food

themselves are
will
sadness.
The
is
things
same
in either case,
but they
not seem
see
to me.
This
a difficulty the story writer
(must
clearly
recognize.
He must
truly
through another's eyes, and to do this he must

identify his
mood with
is
that of the other,
if
the
description
to be true.
chief
it
Inasmuch as the
tion of place
is
danger in the descriptruly vital
that
may not be
and
significant, it is well at this point to
determine
a test for relevancy.
Our consideration has been

scene.
hitherto the reader's opportunity to visualize
and enter into the

is
But
its
often the action
not vitally related to
background.
It
might occur in any one of a dozen places with
DESCRIPTION
equal
effect.
157
suffice
Action and character
of
themselves.
In such a case, too vivid and elabis
orate a description of scene
not helpful, but
rather distracting.*
If,
on the other hand, the
characters are truly influenced
by
their
is
sur-
roundings, then the descriptive setting

tial to
essen-
the reader's appreciation of the emotions
aroused in the persons of the story.

surest test of pertinence.
If the
This
is
is
the
hero
a starv-
ing castaway on a desert island, a vivid picture

of his surroundings
may be essential to our appreThe

description then
ciation of his emotions.

is
an integral part
of the story.
But
if
the hero,
to*
dominated by an emotion which blinds him

his surroundings, hastens to his friend's aid,
description of the journey as
an observant
of place.
traveller
it would appeal t( would be distinctly ou
We must
lies
see through the hero's eyes,j
and
in this instance he sees little or nothing, in a clear grasp of the character

told.
Security
whose experiences are

person,
little
If
he
is
a prosaic
moved by
conscious
be.
the world about him, the
description should seek only those sensations of
which he
fort it
is
is
food and physical commay
may
the thing sought.
The world as it seems to him It must be admitted as a

wish
qualification,
however, that at times, we, the
readers, with our larger point of view

* See analysis of scene in
The Piece of Stringy chapter IV.
158

what
is lost
to contrast
ciate
him with his surroundings, to appreupon him. If contrast is the
aim, descriptive setting, otherwise superfluous
and irrelevant, may be desirable. Emotion we found to be a legitimate part of description, selecting, coloring, and changing the
sense-impressions.
Psychologically,
sensation
and emotion
are, it is said,
but two aspects of the
same
thing.
The
sense impression produces in
me an
scribe
emotion;
my
emotion in turn colors the

If I de-
next sense impression which comes to me.
my sense-impressions
will
apt you
words sufficiently perceive the emotion which I feel,

in
and experience an echo of it. If I reinforce my record of impressions by emphasizing in abstract terms their effect upon me and say that I am
sad or happy, or
if
I transfer these terms to the

it
scene perceived, declaring
to be sad or gloomy,
cheerful or domestic, then I have strengthened
the emotional effect and the facts,

i. e.,
still
have been true to
the record of
my sense-impressions
The
writer
and
their effect
upon
my
emotions.
in his description should seek to discover the
dominant emotion which the scene produces, either upon him or upon the character through whose eyes we look. If he does this he will be
guided in his selection of
to achieve.
details, for
he
will seek
such as harmonize with the effect which he wishes
Other
details,
not in harmony, he
DESCRIPTION
will ignore,
159
and in so doing he will gain both in and in unity of impression. Here as everywhere in story writing, the writer must select, and his selection has always, as its obqualities which jective, simplicity and harmony lie embedded in experience, but which exist always amid distracting and incongruous things.
conciseness
It is necessary here to reconsider in part the
question of the point of view which was discussed

in a previous chapter.
In telHng a story
it is
essential that in every case the point of
view
from which a scene is described be clearly indicated and, once determined, be carefully maintained.
The reason
for this will
be apparent
upon a little consideration. The reader of a story endeavors

of one of the characters,
to
put himself
either in the place of the observant author or
and so
to visualize the
scene described.
fore,
For
initial
clearness,
there-
the descriptive point of view
must be
early
declared.
Preferably, the descriptive point of
view should coincide with that of the character
who
this
is
the centre of the reader's interest, for in
way
the reader
may
follow the changes in

It
is
the action most intimately.
then impera-
tive that the writer describe only those impres-
sions
which could plausibly

is
affect the character
who
the centre of interest.
He
cannot see
around a corner, nor over a high
wall,
and
to
i6o

what
is
describe
going on thus hidden
is
to dis-
tract the reader,
who
in imagination has placed
himself in the centre of the scene,
and who,
though he
range of
may
follow the author beyond the

vision,
human
is
risk of confusion
can do so only at the and imaginative loss. The
imagination
ductile truly,
but
it
cannot regain
the original point of view without effort and loss

of conviction.
If
we employ the term

of sensation
description in its full
and resultant emotion, we shall find that it plays a large part in modern Many a writer nowadays is more confiction.
meaning
cerned with the portrayal of emotion than of
action.
cident.
Robinson Crusoe
is
a bald novel of in-
We
get
little
idea of Robinson's emo-j
tions at
the
modem
any time, and then but crudely. But in/ sea stories of Conrad our interest is
largely in the description.
The
incidents serve
chiefly to afford opportunity for analysis of the
in his person, storms
and emotions. We experience, and the calm of tropic seas, the gloom of African forests and the languorous charm of the East. But there is here no "set description" description, that is, aside from
hero's sensations
the experience of the characters.
It
is all
a part
of the story, indeed constitutes the story.

is
This a very different thing from the nature-writing
of the older school, in
which the heroine paused
DESCRIPTION
of duty.
i6i
to admire the sunset for two pages from a sense
That writing should be specific and concrete rather than abstract and general is a commonplace of criticism.
The reason
is
not far to seek.
Appeals to the senses and to the emotions are
more powerful than those to the intelligence; Shakespeare's plays are more vital contributions
to the philosophy of the average reader than are
the metaphysical speculations
of
Kant.
We
move
in a world of sense appeals;
our emotions
are aroused ten times where our intellects are

stirred
but once.
Therefore literature
is
devoted
to the portrayal of individual actions, to specific

scenes,
and
its
content
is
concrete for the most
part, designed to arouse the emotions through

definite appeals to the senses of sight, hearing,
touch, taste,
and
smell.
We
ask that descrip-
tion vitalize the details of a scene to the point
that
we may
definitely
is
apprehend them in imagiit is
nation.
This
the general law, but
sub-
ject to exceptions.
number
of years ago,
writing, Stephen
sionistic
about fifteen at this Crane developed the impres-
manner
of writing in the short story.
In The Red Badge of Courage and other stories he practised a method of descriptive vividness
which
may
best be likened to the old style post-
ers of startling
and contrasting
colors.
Details
i62
of

background or of personal appearance are
Intrinsically
are,
given an exaggerated emphasis.
by selection, made to important or no, they stand out by vivid epithet and particularizing word and phrase. An abrupt sentence structure The following serves to emphasize this effect. passages from The Bride Comes to Yellow Sky
are characteristic:
Across the sandy street were some vivid green grass plots, so wonderful in appearance amid the sands that burned near them in a blazing sun
that they caused a doubt in the mind. They exactly resembled the grass mats used to represent lawns on the stage. At the cooler end of the railway station a man without a coat sat in a tilted chair and smoked his pipe. The fresh cut banks of the Rio Grande circled near the town, and there could be seen beyond it a great plum-colored plain of mesquite.
A man in a maroon colored flannel shirt, which had been purchased for purposes of decoration, and made, principally, by some Jewish women on the east side of New York, rounded a corner and walked into the main street of Yellow Sky. In either hand the man held a long, heavy, blueblack revolver. Often he yelled, and these cries
shrilly flying
rang through the semblance of a deserted village, over the roofs in a volume that seemed to have no relation to the ordinary vocal strength of a man. It was as if the surrounding
DESCRIPTION
stillness
163
These
cries of ferocious challenge
formed the arch of a tomb over him. rang against
walls of silence. And his boots had red tops with gilded imprints, of the kind beloved in winter by little sledding boys on the hillsides
of
New
England.
I should not speak of this
mannerism were not

still
the influence of Crane and his followers
strong in magazine fiction, and did
it
not bear
intimately upon the problem of description. There is in the method a fatal weakness which we
should note.
purpose.
It
is
this:
the untiring effort to

if
gain descriptive vividness,

its
unrelieved, fails of
is as sharp and no contrast pos-
When
every detail
is
individual as the next, there

sible.
It is as
though a pianist should play

Effects are
fortissimo throughout his sonata.
got by contrast.
vivid detail
is
outstanding
in a neutral context, like a red golfing coat
on a
are
snow-covered
links.
But
if
all
epithets
violent, challenging the attention, in time the
reader grows weary, and the writer

effect.
fails of his
The
is,
skilful writer, therefore, seeks de-
scriptive vividness only

it
when
his story
demands
that
in vital scenes.
He
does not burden
his narrative
with details not strictly relevant,

opportunity
they
afford
for
however much
graphic description, for to emphasize them would
be to distract us from other and more important
i64

Proportion,
all
matters.
phasis
restraint,
contrast,
em-
are terms relevant in this connection,
and more than description is involved, though I have attached my homily to it. A passage in Henry James's essay, **The Art of Fiction," makes clear in better words than
mine, the interdependence of action, dialogue,
and
description.
No
one
is
to be thought of as
a thing apart.
pose.
All are fused for the story's purall
Description so conceived loses
merely
decorative significance,
and becomes a
vital ele-
ment
.
.
of the story structure:
outline," as
That his characters "must be clear in Mr. Besant says he feels that down to his boots; but how he shall make them so is a secret between his good angel and himself. It
.
would be absurdly simple
if
he could be taught
that a great deal of "description" would make them so, or that on the contrary, the absence of description and the cultivation of dialogue, or the absence of dialogue and the multiphcation of "incident," would rescue him from his difficulties. Nothing, for instance, is more possible than that he be of a turn of mind for which this odd, literal opposition of description and aiaiogue, incident and description, has little meaning and light. People often talk of these things as if they had a kind of internecine distinctness, instead of melting into each other at every breath, and being intimately associated parts of one general effort of expression. I cannot imagine
DESCRIPTION
165
composition existing in a series of blocks, nor conceive, in any novel worth discussing at all, of a passage of description that is not in its intention narrative, a passage of dialogue that is not in its intention descriptive, a touch of truth of any sort that does not partake of the nature of incident, or an incident that derives its interest from any other source than the general and only source of the success of a work of art that A novel is a Hving thing, of being illustrative. all one and continuous, like any other organism, and in proportion as it lives will it be found, I think, that in each of the parts there is something of each of the other parts. The critic who over the close texture of a finished work shall pretend to trace a geography of items will mark some frontiers as artificial, I fear, as any that
have been known to history.
good
illustration of description
made
vital
to the story, given an important place,
and yet
I
subordinated to the story-action,
is
not to be
however,
scene as
found in every novelist.
The passage which

is,
quote from Rene Bazin's Redemption

fairly illustrative of the point.
The
described affects the characters somewhat, causing
them
to speak
and act as they do.
That
it
arouses different emotions in the two girls serves

also to reveal personality;
fricDds,
Henriette had already greeted several escaped for the day from their work-
i66
rooms, like herself. One of them walked arm-inarm with a young man. They laughed because they loved each other, and their love was quite new. They crossed the bridge, and Marie followed them for a long time with her sombre, ardent eye. As they reached the end of Bouffay quay, a gust of wind almost blew away their hats. **How lovely to feel the wind," said Henriette. "I have to do without it all the week, in the workroom at least, for at home we are so high up that no feather could keep in curl." "I think it is a nuisance, it makes one untidy," said Marie, pinning up her heavy locks, which were always coming down. By this time the breath of the Loire, with its
fragrance of poplar, had begun to blow around the two girls. It passed in fresh gusts, seeking the sails and mills, and wandering over the country like bees in search of clover. Between each gust the atmosphere seemed dead; it promised to be a very hot day. Henriette and Marie followed the Saint-Felix canal, and so gained the banks of the real Loire, no longer pressed upon by houses, or broken by islands, but flowing wide and slow in an unbroken stream,
between meadows Hghtly set with trees. Toward the east, on the far horizon, the trees were grouped and drawn together, by the effect of distance, so that the river seemed to flow from a blue forest, then they showed more widely scattered, waving above the grass in Unes of pale foUage through which the hght filtered. The stream flowed in the middle, gradually widening
DESCRIPTION
the yellow ripples of
its
167
waters.
The
rising
water covered the sandbanks. The ripe grass bent over the banks and plunged into the current. A single pleasure boat, hidden beneath its sails, glided along the opposite bank. Henriette had waited to reach this point,
The Loutrel's cottage it is! a long way off over there." But when she glanced at Marie, she saw her looking so pale, that it changed the current of her thoughts, and she felt only an invincible desire to console
is still
meaning to say: "See how pretty
this
human
suffering.
is
This quiet descriptive passage

surely not ineffective.
in its place
Yet many an author would subordinate the background yet more. George Meredith, in The Egoist, affords an extreme example. The story
is
confined to Sir Wil-
loughby Patterne's estate. Throughout the book there is a fine outdoor atmosphere. Yet the descriptive hints
from which we are enabled to
contrive a picture are of the briefest,

are always
dialogue.
and these
made an integral part of action or I cite a number of the widely sepaObserve their extreme brevity,
rated passages.
and their reliance upon suggestion rather than upon elaborate detail:
led her about the flower-beds; too much he were giving a convalescent an airing. She chafed at it and pricked herself with re-
He
if
as
i68
morse.
In contrition she expatiated on the beauty of the garden.

''All is yours,
my Clara." oppressive load it seemed to her! She passively yielded to the man in his form of atAn
tentive courtier; his mansion, estate, and wealth overwhelmed her. They suggested the price to be paid. Yet she recollected that on her last departure through the park she had been proud Poison of the rolHng green and spreading trees. She had of some sort must be operating in her.
not come to him to-day with this feeling of sullen antagonism; she had caught it here.
"Because, my dear boy," she said, leaning on her elbow, "you are a very nice boy, but an ungrateful boy, and there is no telling whether you will not punish any one who cares for you. Come along with me; pluck me some of these cowslips and the speedwells near them; I think we both love wild flowers." She rose and took "You shall row me on the lake while his arm.
I talk to
It
you
she,
seriously."
however, who took the sculls at the boat-house, for she had been a playfellow with boys, and knew that one of them engaged
was
manly woman.
in a
exercise
is
not likely to
listen to
The opportunity was offered by Sir Willoughby.

after breakfast Miss Dale walked across the park to see her father, and on this occasion Sir Willoughby and Miss Middleton went with her as far as the lake, all three dis-
Every morning
DESCRIPTION
169
coursing of the beauty of various trees, birches, aspens, poplars, beeches, then in their new green. Miss Dale loved the aspen. Miss Middleton the beech, Sir Willoughby the birch, and pretty things were said by each in praise of the favored object, particularly by Miss Dale. So much so that when she had gone on he recalled one of her
remarks, and said: ''I beHeve, if the whole place were swept away to-morrow, Laetitia Dale could reconstruct it and put those aspens on the north
of the lake in number and situation correctly where you have them now. I would guarantee
her description of
it in
absence correct."
Laetitia tried another neutral theme.
*'The weather to-day suits our country," she

said.
''England, or Patterne Park? I am so devoted to mountains that I have no enthusiasm

for flat land."
call our country flat, Miss Middlehave undulations, hills, and we have sufficient diversity, meadows, rivers, copses, brooks, and good roads, and pretty by-paths." "The prettiness is overwhelming. It is very pretty to see; but to live with, I think I prefer ugHness. I can imagine learning to love ugliness. It's honest. However young you are, you can not be deceived by it. These parks of rich people are a part of the prettiness. I would rather have fields, commons."
"Do you
ton?
We
"The parks give us delightful green walks, paths through beautiful woods." "If there is a right-of-way for the public."
I70
*' There should be," said Miss Dale, wondering; and Clara cried: " I chafe at restraint; hedges and palings everywhere! I should have to travel ten years to sit down contented among these fortifications. Of
course I can read of this rich kind of English country with pleasure in poetry. But it seems What would you say to me to require poetry. " of human beings requiring it?
wood and
Clara gazed over rolling richness of foliage, water, and a church-spire, a town, and horizon hills. There sung a sky-lark. "Not even the bird that does not fly away!'' she said meaning, she had no heart for the bird satisfied to rise and descend in this place.
;
He
crossed a
stile
into the
tlie
lake, where, as
he was in
wood above the humor to think
himself signally lucky, espying her, he took it as a matter of course that the lady who taught his heart to leap should be posted by the Fates. And he wondered Httle at her power, for rarely had the world seen such union of princess and sylph as in that lady's figure. She stood holding by a beech branch, gazing down on the water.
An
instance analogous to this of Meredith
is
that oi
setting
As You Like It, in which is made vivid by means
the woodland
touches.
swift
of but a few For more conventional passages of

effective description, the student is
and
referred to Stevenson
and Kipling. For elaborate
DESCRIPTION
descriptive stories in
action,
171
which description dominates
he
may
consult Conrad, Turgenieff, and

I shall quote, in conclusion, a
Thomas Hardy. number of short
passages to illustrate some of
the points brought out in our discussion:
The two sleek, white well-bullocks in the courtyard were steadily chewing the cud of their evening meal; old Pir Khan squatted at the head of Holden^s horse, his pohce sabre across his knees, pulHng drowsily at a big waterpipe that croaked like a bullfrog in a pond. Ameera's mother sat spinning in the lower veranda, and the wooden gate was shut and barred. The music of a marriage-procession came to the roof above the gentle hum of the city, and a string of flying-foxes crossed the face of the low
.
moon.
(KipHng, Without Benefit of Clergy.)
Here the quality to be observed is the swiftness with which the scene is sketched. Kipling has selected only a few details, but these sufficient to give character to the scene.
is
The
effect
one of heat, and beauty, and strangeness; 6f
domestic content shut in from the world without:

I see the East. I have seen and have looked into its very soul; but now I see it always from a small boat, a high outline of mountains, blue and afar in the
this is
And
how
its secret
places
morning;
of purple at sunset.
my
mist at noon; a jagged wall I have the feel of the oar in hand, the vision of a scorching blue sea in
like faint
172
my
And I see a bay, a wide bay, smooth eyes. as glass and polished like ice, shimmering in the red Kght burns far off upon the gloom dark. of the land, and the night is soft and warm.
We
drag at the oars with aching arms, and suddenly a puff of wind, a puff faint and tepid and laden with strange odors of blossoms, of aromatic wood, comes out of the still night the first That I can never sigh of the East on my face. forget. It was impalpable and enslaving, like a charm, like a whispered promise of mysterious delight. (Joseph Conrad, Youth.)
In
this there is variety of sense appeal;

is
the
whole weight of the description
not placed
upon vision
alone.
Also,
and most important,

details:
we
catch the emotional resultant of the scene,
which serves to unify the selected
The frowsy chamber-maid

had
just finished
of the ''Red Lion" washing the front door steps.
She rose from her stooping posture, and, being from her pail, straight out, without moving from where she The smooth round arch of the falling stood. water glistened for a moment in mid-air. John Gourlay, standing in front of his new house at the head of the brae, pould hear the swash of it when it fell. The morning was of perfect stillof slovenly habit, flung the water
ness.
The hands of the clock across ''the Square" were pointing to the hour of eight. They were
.
yellow in the sun.
DESCRIPTION
173
Blowsalinda, of the Red Lion, picked up the big bass that usually lay within the porch and, carrying it clumsily against her breast, moved off round the corner of the public house, her petticoat gaping behind. Half-way she met the ostler with whom she stopped in amorous daUiance. He said something to her, and she laughed loudly and vacantly. The silly tee-hee echoed up the street. A moment later a cloud of dust drifting round the corner, and floating white in the still air, showed that she was pounding the bass against the end of the house. All over the little town the women of Barbie were equally busy with their There was scarce a man steps and door-mats. to be seen either in the square, at the top of which Gourlay stood, or in the long street descending from its near corner. The men were at work; the children had not yet appeared; the
women were busy

The
and
far
with their household cares.
freshness of the air, the
smoke
rising thin
above the red chimneys, the sunshine glistering on the roofs and gables, the rosy clearness of everything beneath the dawn, above all the quietness and peace, made Barbie, usually so poor to see, a very pleasant place to look down at on a summer morning. At this hour there was an unfamiliar delicacy in the familiar scene, a
freshness
and purity
earthliness
of aspect alpiost-axL-un^-'' as though you viewed through a

it
crystal dream.
L
...
big gate behind *him/ [Gourlay]
of carts being loaded for the day.
Through the came the sound
A horse weary of standing idle between the shafts,
174
kicked ceaselessly and steadily against the ground with one impatient hinder foot, clink, clink,
''Easy, damn ye; clink upon the paved yard. ye'U smash the bricks!" came a voice. Then there was the smart slap of an open hand on a sleek neck, a quick start, and the rattle of chains (Douglas, as the horse quivered to the blow. The House with the Green Shutters,)
f
In the
of
last description the descriptive point
view
is
chiefly notable.
It
is
early
and
clearly
indicated,
and
is strictly
maintained throughout.
is
Thus the scene
of the carters
told
by means
of
sound only, yet so clearly that we can visuaHze it. We hear the chamber-maid's laughter, but
not her words, for
we
are too far away.
When
she goes around the corner of the house, the

cloud of dust indicates that she
is
cleaning the
door-mat.
CHAPTER IX
DIALOGUE
Speech
as
in short stories
of all, reveal character.
It
and novels must, first is by speech as well

is
by
action
and analysis that personality
made
As the people of the story differ one from another, so must their speech be in character. The newsboy must not speak like a poet; the sincere man must speak
real to the reader. sincerely,
and the
false
friend reveal
reader at least
his
of
to
the
duplicity.
This
is
not to
say that every word need bear, always, the stamp
There are many occasions in one differs not at all from the speech of another, in which no characterization is possible. There is a common ground of utterance of which all that is asked is that the
of individuality.
which the speech
many
But in must be something more, be accurately significant and individual, conveying

speech shall not be out of character.
instances
it
unmistakably the personahty of the speaker,
who
That
differs
it
from every one else in the story. should do this impHes, of course, that
175
176

He must
the writer enter truly into the hearts and speak
through the mouths of his characters.
be an actor
skilled in
many
parts,
is
which he can
fully realized
lay aside at will.
This power
by
Shakespeare, whose characters usually reveal
themselves with marked individuality, and are

eternally dififerent one
from another.
Othello
and lago
differ
not only in their deeds, but in
their speech as well.

characteristic.
Act and word are aHke
Yet the record

not
suffice
of characteristic speech does
to constitute dialogue;
his story.
If
the writer
must
tion
also
advance
he becomes ab-
sorbed in his dialogue he
may
devise conversa-
which
less,
interests the reader,
but which, none

proportions,
the
retards the action.
The
the true emphasis of his story, will suffer thereby.
The
characters
must
set forth certain precon-
These must be adequately developed; neither must they be overemphasized.

ceived situations.
Once a
situation
is
clearly revealed the story pro-
ceeds to the development of a second.

shorter the development,
if
The
adequate to the needs
of the story, the better. To achieve this dual purpose of speech, characterization and develop-
ment
of situation,
it
is
difficult thing;
good story
chapter
is
may
easily
yet in a be remarked. The
passage from Markheim quoted in an earlier

a line instance.
There we saw not
DIALOGUE
177
only the character of the prospective murderer, but were also enlightened by every speech as to Character development the impending action.
and action proceeded hand

interdependent.
,'
in hand, mutually
In the accomplishment of his story purpose
through dialogue, the writer must meet and overcome several difficulties if he is to be clear, swift, and at the same time achieve an effect of naturalIn conversation we rely not upon words ness. alone, but upon tone of voice, gesture, and play
of feature.
From
these
we
interpret the impli-
cations of the thing said, the spirit which ani-
mates the words and gives them These

are, so to speak, the
significance.
context of the spoken
phrase.
Herein
:
lies
one of the problems of the
story writer
he must learn to make his dialogue

It
convey not only superficial meanings, but the

very intent of the speaker.
writer
is
true that the
may describe
the tone of the speaker, and
may
even declare the intent, thus illuminating
the utterance, but to do this overmuch would
be to make the story tedious and slow. Instead he must, for the most part, so phrase his dialogue
that without explanatory comment its meaning and intent are unmistakable both to the other This, persons of the story, and to the reader. however, is but half the difficulty. If we were to make a phonographic record of
178

we hear
in
the conversation
social functions
pubUc
places, or at
on the
it
street-car, in stores, or
at receptions
and dinner
parties
its
we should be
general inade-
struck on rehearing
with
quacy.
From many words would emerge but a

meaning, and
this often
slight kernel of
not clear
and unmistakable.
Ours
tion,
is
We
are poor speakers,
of us, unable to express precisely
most what we mean.
not a
rifle
which pinks the bull's-eye of
meaning, but a shotgun aimed in a general direc-
but one attains its proper objective. is repetitious and inaccurate.
and from our scattered remarks perhaps Our speech

the story writer to take his conversation
life,
Were
It
is
unchanged from
he would be long-winded.
his task to clarify the turbid

it
and wasteful
flow of speech and direct
into exact channels.
His characters must speak to an end, and that end must be swiftly and accurately realized. In
so far as dialogue attains this artistic perfection
it differs
selective
from the language of every day. It is and interpretative rather than Hteral.
concise phrase the speaker's
The
writer should, then, set himself the task
of conveying in
thought, the intended meaning, rather than of

reporting with plausible accuracy the inadequate
That he shall fail to do this is a danger if he is endowed with some gift of auditory imagination, and can start his charspoken words.
real
DIALOGUE
They
their
will,
179
acters conversing with a degree of naturalness.
then, too often take the story into
talk to no profitable end; become an end in itself. It is a danger which besets young and clever writers who are carried away by the reality of their own As a check upon this tendency the creations. writer must keep constantly before him the purposes of dialogue character revelation and the advancement of the story action.
own hands and
the dialogue will
LiTERALNESS OF SPEECH
Let us now turn to another aspect of the
problem
of effective dialogue, that of literalness
of speech.
phonographic record of chance
conversation would reveal,
we
said, the general
inadequacy and wordiness of normal speech.

ciation
It
would reveal yet more; peculiarities of pronun-
and
diction,
when our
meaning
attention
which we pass unheeding is centred rather on the

its
of speech
than on
manner, would on
is
our record be apparent.
There
a normal pro-
nunciation varying in different classes of society,
and a normal vocabulary, likewise variable,

which we individually approximate but to which no one of us exactly conforms. All are possessed
of
mannerisms to a greater or
less degree.
What
heed must the writer pay to these individual or

class differences?
The
question
is
not simple,
i8o

which must
for there are several considerations
be taken into account.
We may safely generalize

story
attention to
itself;
to this extent: in a
any departure from normal speech

therefore
all
attracts
departure must
pose.
be intentional, must be for a legitimate purIt may be that I have the bad habit of
pronouncing
g of
my
a's flatly or of slurring
the final
my
participles.
This peculiarity reveals a
from the best usage of English speech, and bespeaks some inadequacy in my training, or, it may be, only an imperfect ear,
slight departure
which makes
defects.
it difficult for
me
to reaHze
my own
Were
my
conversation recorded with

stor}^,
phonetic accuracy in a
that they should do so?
ceive instances in
my
mistakes of
speech would attract attention.
Is it legitimate
It is possible to con-
which so accurate a record might be within the story's intent, but generally it is an irrelevant and unimportant matter.
Specialists in phonetics are concerned with
such matters.
purpose.
The story -writer has another
But
let
us take an extreme case.

is
characters
a plantation negro
One of my who speaks a
marked
dialect.
Shall I record his utterance
accurately or shall I not?

first of all,
Perhaps I should,
If these are
consider
my
audience.
Southerners, to
whom
this dialect is familiar, I
DIALOGUE
may
be as
literal as I please.
i8i
If
my
audience
is
a broader one, containing those unfamiliar with

the dialect, the task is more complicated. To them the negro dialect is a strange tongue, known, if at all, but slightly, and they must puzzle over much of it. In any case it is sufficiently novel to distract them from the story, from the con-
tent of speech to a mannerism.

action
is
If the storyis
of importance, its effectiveness
im-
paired thereby.
What must be
made
shall I
done?
Shall
my
plantation negro be
to speak simple
his speech
but correct English, or
modify
is
somewhat?
reality;
if
If the first, his
speech
untrue to
the second,
it is still
untrue, but in
less degree.
Let
us, for
argument, select the second half of

nor bizarre, but sufficiently
the alternative, and endeavor to contrive a dialect neither obscure
characteristic to differentiate the speaker
from
the other persons of the story.
How must we go
The more difficult obscurities must be modified, and but few mannerisms retained, enough to suggest the nature of the true
about our task?
speech, to give
it flavor,
make
us pause as
we
read.
but not sufficient to The meaning of the
words should be apparent at a glance, so that we may proceed with the story undeterred. Such a dialect as we have devised must, of course, be consistent with itself, and must be devoid of
i82

Our
to
peculiarities foreign to the original speech.
method has been

It is as
tral
make it approximate normal
speech, while retaining a tincture of the original.
element;
is
though we should dilute it with a neuits character remains the same, its
not so great.
potency
It requires
few and slight variations from the

this distinctive
normal to produce
dialect.
quality of
treat of
The majority
What,
of writers
who
Scotch, Irish, or negro Hfe err on the side of

literalness.
to a
is
Scotchman,
to
is
simple
and
intelligible
enough,
any one
else largely
obscure.
Thus we have the

realists.
so-called "kail-yard
school" of Scotch
Their method
is
not
that of Stevenson or, to a lesser degree, Scott,
both Scotchmen, but writers not for their coun-
trymen
alone.
That the story should be
intelli-
gible to his readers should
be the writer^s chief
concern.
If, to accomplish this, he must depart from actuahty, let him do so. His story is not a Uteral transcript from hfe, but an artificial rearrangement of Ufe.
tions thus far that dialect
Yet we must not conclude from our generalizaand class speech are
never to be accurately recorded for others than

those to
whom
that speech
is
famihar.
There
are stories which have as their chief purpose to
portray background, manners of Hfe, and speech.
These
stories are
seldom of the
first
rank, and
DIALOGUE
183
bear to the best stories about the relation that a good photograph bears to a good painting.
Photographs, however, have their place and

too, these Hteral records of
life.
so,
lies
Their value
in the accuracy of the observed detail.
To
the
reader they are interesting chiefly

of their novelty.
by reason
though
Nowadays
energetic,
often imoriginal, writers seek out the less
known
corners of the earth for the simple purpose of exploiting a fresh background.
But
stories pos-
sessed of this quality alone cannot long
command
a hearing, and already the public wearies of dialect, save,
perhaps, as a device for the creation
of
humor.
Just as
we
find fantastic dress
amus-
ing and the habits and dress of
foreigners, so
do we find dialect humorous.

therefore, absurd.
We
do not speak
is,
as these people; their speech being unlike ours
It would, perhaps,
be interesting to trace in
literal-
English or American fiction the growth of

ness in recording speech pecuHarities.
We have
not here the space for so lengthy an examination.
Washington Hawthorne make no attempt to catch dialect, with perhaps some consequent loss in realism, and perhaps, some gain in unity of impression. The negro dialect of Poe differs
It will suffice to point out that
Irving and
considerably from that of Joel Chandler Harris

or
Thomas Nelson Page
these
last it
seems to
i84
me
are on the whole too painstakingly accurate, and are rather hard to read. I cite two examples of Scotch dialect, the first from Scott, and the second from Barrie. Scott seems to me to have retained the flavor of the speech, and yet to have made its understanding swift and easy. B arrie's is closer to the soil, but attracts more attention to
itself.
How
true either
is
to life I cannot say.

illustrates the possi-
The
selection
from Kipling
humor inherent in realistic class speech. Again, just how true to life this may be I do not
bilities of
know, nor
is it
a matter of any importance:
Sir Robert sat, or, I should say, lay, in a great arm-chair, wi' his grand velvet gown, and his feet on a cradle; for he had baith gout and gravel, and his face looked as gash and ghastly as Satan's. Major Weir sat opposite to him, in a red-laced coat, and the laird's wig on his head; and aye as Sir Robert girned wi' pain, the jackanape girned too, like a sheep's head between a pair of tangs an ill-faur'd, fearsome couple they were. The laird's buff-coat was hung on a pin behind him, and his broadsword and his pistols within reach; for he keepit up the auld fashion of having the weapons ready, and a horse saddled day and night, just as he used to do when he was able to loup on horseback, and away after ony of the hill-folk he could get speerings of. Some said it was for fear of the Whigs taking vengeance, but I judge it was just his auld custom he wasna gien to fear onything. The rental book, wi' its
DIALOGUE
185
black cover and brass clasps, was lying beside him; and a book of sculduddery sangs was put betwixt the leaves, to keep it open at the place where it bore evidence against the goodman of Primrose Knowe, as behind the hand with his mails and duties. Sir Robert gave my gudesire a look, as if he would have withered his heart in Ye maun ken he had a way of bendhis bosom. ing his brows that men saw the visible mark of a horseshoe in his forehead, deep-dinted, as if it
had been stamped

Willie's Tale.)
there.
(Scott,
Wandering
"Leeby kent perfectly weel," Jess has said, was a trial to Jamie to tak her ony gait, an' I often used to say to her 'at I wonder at her want o' pride in priggin' wi' him. Aye, but if she could juist get a promise wrung oot o' him, she didna care hoo muckle she had to prig. Syne they quarreled, an' ane or baith o' them grat (cried) afore they made up. I mind when Jamie went to the fishin' Leeby was aye terrible
*'*at it
keen to go wi' him, but ye see he couldna be seen gaen through the toon wi' her. *If ye let me gang,' she said to him, 'I'll no seek to go through the toon wi' ye. Na, I'll gang roond by the roods an' you can tak the buryin'-ground road, Yes, Leeby was so as we can meet on the hill.' wiUin' to agree wi' a' that, juist to get gaen wi' him. I've seen lassies makkin' themsel's sma' for lads often enough, but I never saw ane 'at prigged so muckle wi' her ain brother. Na, it's other lassies' brothers they like as a rule." (Barrie, Leeby and Jamie.)
i86

to say
"I^m going out
adoo to
my
girl," said
o'
Lew
to cap the climax.
touch
my
me
kit
"Don't none because it's wanted for
you
active
service,
bein' specially invited to go
by the
Colonel."
He
strolled forth
trees at the
back
of the
and whistled in the clump of Married Quarters till
Cris came to him, and, the preliminary kisses being given and taken, Lew began to explain the
situation.
"I'm goin' to the front with the Reg'ment," he said vaUantly. "Piggy, you're a little liar," said Cris, but her heart misgave her, for Lew was not in the habit
of l3dng.
"Liar yourself, Cris," said Lew, slipping an
arm round her. "I'm goin'. When the Reg'ment marches out you'll see me with 'em, all
and gay. Give us another kiss, Cris, on the strength of it." "If you'd on'y a-stayed at the Depot where you ought to ha' been you could get as many of 'em as as you dam please," whimpered Cris, putting up her mouth. "It's 'ard, Cris. I grant you it's 'ard. But
galliant
what's a man to do? If I'd a-stayed at the Depot, you wouldn't think anything of me." "Like as not, but I'd 'ave you with me, Piggy. An' all the thinkin' in the world isn't like kissin'." "An' all the kissin' in the world isn't like 'avin'
a medal to wear on the front of your coat." " You won't get no medal." "Oh, yus, I shall though. Me an' Jakin are the only acting-drummers that'll be took along.
DIALOGUE
All the rest
is full
187
men, an'
we'll get
our medals
with them."
ha' taken anybody but you, You'll get killed you're so venturesome. Stay with me, Piggy darlin', down at the Depot, an' I'll love you true forever." (Kipling,
"They might
Piggy.
The Drums oj
the
Fore and Aft.)
I have endeavored to
make
clear thus far that
speech in stories seldom corresponds literally
with the speech of every day.
It
is
selected
and
improved
standardized.
may,
to
Individual and class

sure,
peculiarities
be
be suggested to
upon the character of the story; but the color we bestow upon the individual utterance is seldom more than a
some
degree, this depending
tincture suggesting the
far this standardization
human original. How may be carried in an inmade

the
It
is
dividual instance cannot, of course, be
worth noting, however, that we must at times almost comof a generalization.
theme
pletely standardize the speech of our characters,
and all writers might resort more frequently than they do.
to the expedient
Consider the in-
stance of the foreigner speaking his native tongue.
What must be the writer's method when the Grand Duke accosts the heroine in Russian?
Give the exact words of his greeting?
This
is
sometimes inconvenient; not all of us are familiar with Russian. But the writer knows the Duke's
i88
thoughts, and may, therefore, translate for us.
Grand Duke speaks good idiomatic Russian no reason why his remarks should not be rendered in idiomatic English. Too often the
If the
there
is
author translates idiom

writers, familiar with
literally,
thus producing
a laughable and un-English dialect.
Competent
French or German, are

analogous
to
sometimes guilty of such a practice for humorous

purposes
humor
strictly
the
misspellings of Josh Billings.
The
truly artistic
writer, however, translates into simple, idiotaatic
English, which serves easily and clearly to reveal the speaker's thoughts.
Is
not this transla-
tion of a foreign tongue analogous to the translation of a dialect of one's
own tongue?
In the employment of a standardized language

as
common
of society
to characters drawn from all classes and various environments, are we not,
reality,
however, losing something of the flavor of

the true quality of Hfe as
we
experience it?
There is justice in such a demurrer. Certainly it would be unwise to dogmatize overmuch, for
the exceptions to the rule would be outstanding.
We
must make
if
clear
to base our practice;

implicit,
some principle upon which and this, I think, has been

our discussion:
the
not
explicit, in
degree of literalness advisable in the speech of

story characters
is
dependent always upon the
audience and the aim of the story.
The
audi-
DIALOGUE
ence may, or
189
may
form
story
of speech
not, be so familiar with the employed as to grasp its content
easily
and wholly. Further, the theme of the and its tone must determine the character
If the writer is
of the speech.
with manners,
acters
fit
concerned mostly with external and superficial things, the form of speech he permits his char-
may
make
be as near that of reahty as he sees

it.
to
The more
his story concerns itless
self
with deep and universal themes, the
should the manner of speech distract our attention
from
these.
Contrast
is,
however, always
possible, the gravity of the
with the inadequacy of

in
theme contrasting the speech, and gaining

in speech
power and suggestion thereby. After all, it is not by class differences
that
we
chiefly distinguish the servant
from the
capitalist.
The
difference lies in the attitude of
mind, the one deferential and the other lordly;
and
this attitude
may be
superficial differences in
best caught not by word and intonation, but

expressed.
by the thought and emotion

transportation
official
The
on boat or railway may speak the same English as I, but his spirit is haughty and intolerant, and mine is humble
before him;
my
deference
is
shown best by the

dis-
stumbling question which I put to him, his

dain by the hard-clipt reply.
difference in attitude
There
is
here a
and phrasing, though none
ipo
in the pronunciation or the selection of words.

It
is a more vital difference, one both individual and functional. The skilled writer can convey a man's class and personality in a phrase, and
this
fine
in
nowise peculiar as English.
single
example occurs to me from Maupassant's The Necklace. The husband of the heroine is given to remark with satisfaction as he seats himself at dinner, "Ah, the good stew!" Could
any phrase be more enlightening?

the
We
conceive
and unshabby lot, content with his home, with himself, and with his wife. He is both an individual and a member of a class, for in his exclamation he reveals both unmistakably. Immediately we understand the irritation of his ambitious wife. He was not one to be caught by the glamour of fashion! Doubtto be hopelessly middleclass
aspiring, content with his
less this is
man
a striking instance, but
it illustrates
the possibilities of suggestion lying within com-
mon
speech, speech
unmarked with
dialect or
class pecuUarities.
The Key of Dialogue

It is
but a step from the foregoing discussion
what Stevenson calls "the key of dialogue," by which is meant the tone of conversation
to
whether
it
be base, commonplace, or elevated,

romantic, tragic or in the vein
of
realistic or
DIALOGUE
light
191
comedy.
Thus
in Shakespeare the
comic
characters speak usually in prose and employ the

diction appropriate thereto.
earlier scenes of the tavern;
Prince Hal, in the
with Falstaff, talks the language

later,
words are kingly.

of a story.
when he becomes king, his Something the same is true
The
writer endeavors to
make
his
dialogue in keeping with the theme of his story,
and
this appropriateness involves to
gree subject-matter,
some deand to a greater degree
manner
of speech.
It is difficult in seeking illustrations of subject-
matter, to cite instances which

in point.
fitting
must always be
Conceivably any subject

of
may
be a
theme
discussion in
some story or
play.
In the plays of Brieux, for example,
topics are discussed

fit
which are usually considered
only for medical books.

feel
Yet
in these plays
is
we do not
manner
that the discussion
out of place;
the themes are essential to the play, and the

of their discussion
is
such as to provoke
grave interest.
Any
theme,
we might
declare,
will serve for discussion if in the right place.
The difficult thing is to determine

in story
tests.
the right place.
What flagrant offences to taste may be committed

and drama The drama
the Hterature of the day atin particular
is
guilty.
It
resorts persistently to the
tionships;
problem of sex relar yet in comedies how seldom is the
192

It
is
subject discussed in good taste.
not that
the relations of
men and women,
married and
unmarried, do not afford capital themes for
comedy, but there are many graver aspects which may be approached only with caution.
false
turn to the dialogue and the result
is
vulgarity, not
If
humor.
is
the story
concerned with lofty action the

a thing to
hero
ache.
may
not appropriately speak of the tooththat the tooth-ache

feel
is
Not
make
light of,
but we
that
it is
essentially trivial
in its ultimate
significance,
thing seemingly less important
and
so in keeping.
Thus a
whereas many a may be significant bizarre dream may

is
be appropriate for discussion, for a dream
to
some degree
significant of thought,
and
so, it
may
be,
prophetic of action to come.
point of etiquette
may not be
trivial, for
Or a manners
may
indicate character or signify amiable or
hostile intent.
sation
In short, the theme of convermust be in the tone of the story. If the story is light and trivial it may not deal with the
If serious or tragic
problems of the universe.

there
subjects
must be no admission
of trivial or petty
save perhaps
This
is
for contrast, and, occa-
sionally, pathos,
times.
which may be so secured at no more than to say, perhaps, that the writer must be possessed of taste. Yet life is notoriously in bad, or at least mixed^
DIALOGUE
taste.
193
Your mood is one your thoughts are upon conduct and religion, and kindred themes. All the time you are conscious, in the scene about you, of absurd
of grief;
You attend a funeral.
and incongruous
details.
The accoutrements
its
of
plumes and mock curtains, the hideous garb of mourning, the attitudes and expression of those in grief all
death, the absurd hearse with
these clash with the genuine though not over-
whelming emotion which you

personality
is
feel.
Your own
its
not subject altogether to
domi-
nant mood; unconsciously you note the incongruities about you, and your mind suggests
humorous
possibilities
and
irrelevancies.
is
This
of all
is true, is it
not, unless
one emotion
Life
is
so domi-
nant as to exclude
things.
all else?
mixed
emotions and of congruous and incongruous
The
writer improves
on
life
in that he frees
action and emotion, and so, consequently, speech,

of irrelevancies.
It is his function to
make
life
congruous.
Therefore must his characters speak
upon topics in harmony with the central theme and not of things which will arouse conflicting
emotions.
The
writer
is
seeking to
make a
uni-
fied impression,
and so he takes care that every-
thing shall contribute to that impression, no
touch suggesting incongruous associations hostile

to his aim.
He may,
of course, wish to create a
194
mixed impression and so adopt a mixed style. This is legitimate, and therein lie possibiUties of
contrast.
pler,
Usually, however, his object
is
sim-
and his danger that of incongruity. He must guard against themes which may arouse
in the reader emotions hostile to the one he
seeks.
He
cannot, of course, do this with cer-
some of his readers will have the most imexpected and unconventional emotions associated with common objects. Whereas pine-trees are usually regarded as sombre and funereal, the mention of them may evoke in some the utmost hilarity. Against this individual variant there h no defence, but the writer should be
tainty, for
sufficiently
wide-awake to the associations which
various topics will arouse in the average mind.
Thus
Coleridge's
poem upon
the young ass has
never been reverently approached by the majority of readers.
More
speech
cific
subtle
itself.
and
is
difficult is the
problem of the
is,
Language, besides denoting spea tissue of connotations; that
thoughts,
of associated meanings,
and of these the writer broad and accurate knowledge. should have a A mere range of vocabulary does not make a stylist. He must know the current values of speech, its colloquial and slang uses as well as No writer its noble and its poetic implications. to read good English, nor, I believe can afford not
DIALOGUE
195
can he afford not to know colloquial and even bad English. All are but forms of expression, as both viohn and jew's-harp are instruments of
music, both capable, perhaps, of effective employment in the hands of Richard Strauss. But
must know very accurately what is is not, what is slangy, and what is colloquial but sound. Thus the phrase "to start something" means in slang to make a disthe writer
good and what
turbance or trouble,
state the
though in their natural words have no such idiomatic meaning.

its literal
its
careful writer would, in a serious passage,
seek to avoid this form of words in
meaning, even were

vagueness.
it
not unfit by reason of
He would
seek at some inconve-
nience to find an adequate substitute happily free
from incongruous meanings and associations.

This
is
trivial instance,
but typical enough.

of his native
Any
writer
who
wishes a
command
speech must master such values, as well as distinctions
more
elegant.
The study
is
endless,
for the values of speech are ever changing.
His
his
ear
must be trained
is
to speech as that of the musi-
cian
trained to gradations of tone, for
upon
nice use of
words
in their connotation as well as
their denotation,
depends the tone and
signif-
icance of every utterance.
The classes of words are various and many. We have slangy speech, colloquial speech, localisms.
196

types of professional speech,
dialects, various
learned words and popular words, poetic words
and prosy words. And the problem of mastery made more difficult in that many words belong at one and the same time to several classes, and in combination take on various shades of
is
meaning.
What
Stevenson
doubtless meant,
when he
must
declared that the writer
must pitch
his
dialogue to a certain key, was not only that he

select suitable
discussion,
and congruous themes for but that he must select his words to
In a story of exalted action or
harmonize.
and colloquialisms are out of quiet reahsm the speech may be homely and colloquial. Here exaggerated or poetic diction would be as much out of keeping as would be slang in the first instance. The young writer is as prone to err in one
poetic theme, slang
of place.
In a story
direction as the other.

rural
life
In his simple story of
he makes
his characters talk as
do the
kings of Shakespeare;
in his fairy tale he im-
ports the language of the street.

lies in
The remedy
Only from a
reading, in training the ear to an appre-
ciation of the subtleties of speech.
knowledge
of the practice of the best writers will
he be able to select words which are harmonious and appropriate in every instance.
Our
discussion has,
it
seems, transcended the
question of dialogue, and treated of diction in
DIALOGUE
197
somewhat broader terms. But stories are not told in dialogue alone. The writer telling the story in his own person is subject to the same His narrative must be in key with restrictions.
the speech of his characters.
final
quotation
from Stevenson's Letters
will serve
by way
of
summary
to emphasize the point:

is very difficult; your characters it is
a the time. And the difficulty of according the narrative and the dialogue (in a work of the third person) is extreme. That is one reason out of half a dozen why I so often prefer the first. It is much in my mind just now, because of my last work, just off the stocks three days ago, The Ehh Tide: a dreadful, grimy business in the third person, where the strain between a vilely realistic dialogue and a narrative style pitched about (in phrase) "four notes higher" than it should have been has sown my head with grey hairs; or I believe so if my head escaped, my heart has them.
terrible strain to carry
all
Yes, honestly, fiction
CHAPTER X
TYPES OF STORY IDEAS

Classification of story themes into a small but inclusive number of types is a not uncommon practice in books upon story technic. We
have
of
stories of the contest of
man
with man,
man
with
fate,
and
similar groupings as
classification,
you
please.
This method of
however,
takes no account of the thought processes in-
herent in the creative act.
more
profitable
grouping for our purposes will

the
be one which con-
cerns itself with the inception of the story,
method
of story
and development by which the

Stories so classified
stories of action, character,
will
fall
writer realizes his intent.

fall
into five groups
setting, idea,
possible, I think, to
and emotional effect. It show that all stories
be
into
one or another of these divisions.

Stories of action constitute the greater part of
all stories,
both long and short. Thus the Odyssey,

Tales,
Grimm^s Fairy
son Crusoe, the novels of
The Arabian Nights, RobinDumas and Scott, and short stories innumerable are narratives of action.
198

That IS not to say that
devoid of action.
It
199
these ignore character
and
setting, nor, again, that stories of other types are

is
a question of emphasis,
and back
of that, the story inception.
Homer
took as his theme the wanderings of Ulysses; De Foe imagined a man to be shipwrecked on a
desert island.
Kipling in The
Man Who
Would
Be King imagined
the adventures of a white
man
who, in a savage corner of the globe, set himself up as ruler. In each instance the writer was chiefly interested in the action, and sought to
develop a series of incidents which might fittingly
set forth the action
of the story.
To
this
theme which was the germ end all other interests are
with the action, thereconcerned.
is
subordinated, and
fore,
it is
that the reader
Let us examine the creative process more

specifically.
I desire to write a story of action

fit
and
am
seeking a
theme.
In the newspaper
I read the ancient tale of the
young woman who

fitted
flagged the train just short of the broken bridge;

of the wealthy
yachtsman who has
out an
expedition to seek the buried treasure of Captain
Kydd;
of the suitor
who
to
disguised himself as a
footman or a chauffeur
be near
his lady-love
despite parental objection.
Or
may
imagine
circumstances equally diverting:

the sheriff
the story of
the outlaw,
who
pursues
Bad
Bill,
and traps him by quaint device
(this
yet to be
200

Again, a story of quiet action:
falls in
invented).
young man
love with a photograph (an

discover
ancient theme), and seeking to

original finds her to
the
be a
girl
he already knows,
but whom, in the photograph, he has failed to The themes are endless; every day recognize.
we have innumerable
to be sure,
suggestions, not
all
good,
and many, like those suggested, already employed a hundred times. But wherever
I find
my theme, my interest has been

I develop
it,
centred in
the compHcation of the story, in
its incidents,
and
if
my
creative act consists in
elaborating
and
relating the action.
dentally do I create character
propriate background.
Only inciand imagine an apThese are of secondary

be so to
importance to me, and

if
will
my
its
readers,
I hold a just
emphasis as I write.
Suppose, however,
in character.
my
story has
inception spring
Here, again, the idea
may
from
ess
specific observation or
from the unaided

I
imagination.
If observation, the creative procthis:
may
be
in Smith,
m^ neighbor,
struck
by an extreme
conscientiousness.
am He
performs his every duty with painstaking thoroughness.
There are other quaUties
in
Smith
which, for
my
purposes, are irrelevant.
He
is
rather forgetful, and has neglected to repay the

three dollars he once borrowed of
knowing
his sensitiveness, will
me; and I, never remind him.

For
201
my story Smith is a man with

man
the one domiI
nant quality, conscientiousness.

ceive a
then
con-
resembling Smith, but freed of his
forge tfulness
I place in a situation
and other distracting traits. which will try him

It
Him
to the
utmost, reveal the
full potentialities of his
charlife
acter in the one direction.
may
be that
has never tried the real Smith in such fashion.
In
my
story, therefore, I present

let
my
creation
with a conflict of choices,
us say one of love

for wife or child,
if
and duty.
The
love
may
be
the situation sufficiently vital that
he follow
the dictates of his conscience his love

suffer in the
person of wife or son.

this choice.
must The situation

any one
of
turns
upon
I supply
dozen
flict.
sets of circumstances to set forth the con-
Smith
may
be a judge on the bench, and

;
commit
house.
tance;
his son to prison
he
may cause his wife's

custom
arrest for smuggling laces through the
The
incidents are of secondary imporis
my
object
to reveal the soul of Smith.
Thus the theme of my story has been character, and I have sought to invent circumstances which
will reveal character.
This
writer.
titled
is
the
method followed by many a story
Turgenieff, for instance, has a story en-
of the Steppes in which the chief character does as the mad king, and suffers as
he.
A Lear
The drcumstances
are different, of course;
202

life
the whole manner of
and the
setting are
totally unlike those of the play.

nieff writes of
Again, Turge-
a Russian Hamlet, a
is this:
man
of dis-
eased
will.
The procedure
to conceive
an interesting character and then to reveal that character in suitable incidents and situations.
The
reader
is
interested in the action, as
is
the
author, primarily as a
an end in
itself.
an end, not as Stevenson's Markheim, already

to
means
quoted in another connection, is a story of this type,* his, A Lodging for the Night a second. Examples may be found on every hand. To
mention but one more, already discussed, Maupassant's The Coward is an excellent illustration But though the examples are of the method.
obvious enough,
it is
well to
writers achieve their effects only
remember that the by a rigid adIf,
herence to the germinal idea.

character, the action should
in a story of
assume a command-
ing place in the reader's attention, the story
would be
is
less effective.
all else
the goal,
As character portrayal must be subordinated to it.
The
third t3ê of story, that of setting or

is
background,
of action.
not so
character and far less
common as the story of common than the story

its
The theme has

this.
origin in
some
I
such manner as
As
I ride through the
East End of London toward West

It
Ham
am
may
also be classed as a story of idea.
203
impressed by the dreary monotony of the scene:

the endless rows of brick cottages, ugly, and
fashioned
of trees
all alike;
the dusty streets, the dearth
and grass. It is respectable enough, not a slum, but depressingly uniform and, seemingly,
utterly hopeless.
I resolve to write a story ex-
pressive of the dreary
must be
monotony of the life which However, as I do not know English life accurately, I transfer my story to a similar district of Chicago with which I am more familiar. And I endeavor to make my story
lived here.
express
what the setting suggests
to me.
I select
my
incidents with this in view, rigidly excluding
such as are not in keeping
those cheerful, gay,

must harmo-
and hopeful.
nize.
My
characters, too,
They
are the product of the environment
which I depict.
In this fashion I endeavor to
create a unity of impression and to subordinate
everything to the background so that
my reader,
as he leaves the story, will carry away, as his

chief impression, a visual image of the place for which I have interpreted one of the meanings. Yet I need not always make my incidents and characters harmonize with the scene, for there is
It may be that life in the environment I have selected is gay and hopeful, not unlike life in better-favored surroundings
a single alternative.
or at
any
rate I
may
imagine
it
to be so.
Then
I can use
my
gray setting for contrast, a back-
204

tints of
is al-
ground against which the varicolored

life
appear
all
the
more
vivid.
Contrast
ways a possible alternative to uniformity. Our illustration may, however, be misleading to some. Any setting which prompts a story impulse will serve, and the impulses may be many and utterly diverse. There are romantic scenes calling for romantic stories to do them justice;
scenes
ideally
suited
to
tender
love
stories;
and humorous treatment because of their whimsicaHty or absurdity. Whatever it is the writer may feel, his obUgation and method are clear; he must devise a story to fit the scene, or, as an alternative, one which contrasts sharply with it. The second is the more difficult to do, but is the more effective if done well. 0. Henry, in some of his excellent stories, achieves notable effects in contrast, a theme pathetic or tragic contrasting with bizarre and inscenes which call for
scenes which suggest mystery and horror;
congruous surroundings.
Of
stories illustrative of setting,
two or three
Poe's Fall of the House of Usher would seem to have originated in the sight of some old and melancholy mansion
falling into
may
be cited in conclusion.
decay which prompts the author to
contrive a story in
pressive of
it.
harmony with
is
if
it,
and
ex-
This, at least,
the probable
origin of the story
we may judge from
the
205
title, the descriptive emphasis upon the house, and the picture which haunts the reader when the story is done. Of Stevenson's Merry Men there can be no doubt, for the author remarks in his letters that the story was written to convey a sense of the terror of the sea upon a wild coast,* and that he had a specific place in mind as he
wrote.
The
action he designed to harmonize
with and express the scene.
Moreover,
it is
the
picture of the place which he wished to
memorable.
all else of
make This it is which we remember when

is
the story
forgotten:
**My uncle himself is not the story as I see it, only the leading episode of that story. It's really a story of wrecks, as they appear to the
dweller on the coast.
It's a
view of the sea."
Conrad's story. Heart of Darkness, previously

mentioned,
type.
is
also
an excellent example
of this
cussed are
intent
Yet though the notable examples we have disamong the few of whose origin and
we can be
certain, there
can be no doubt
that place has more than a
little to
do with the
germination of
many
a story to be classed pri-
marily as one of character or action.
story
*This, again, might serve to classify the story as one of emotional efifect. Undoubtedly scene and emotion go hand in hand here, not to be divorced, and either may have been the prime impulse.
2o6

lie
theme may
fitting scene,
undeveloped in the mind for
long and then of a sudden coalesce with some
and in a moment a story is created. Here it would be unsafe to declare the scene a prime cause of the story, but that it was vital to the act of creation is none the less true. Nor
can we say how often setting
author's
is
present in the
mind
as he plans the action of his story.
it may be indefinite and yet color the and determine the choice and nature of the story
Often
incidents.
Stories of idea, a fourth classification, are, I

believe, of
growing importance; to
the most interesting.

stories originate.
me they are Let us see how such

are the result, usually,
life.
They
of the author's generalized observations of
From
his experience the
author comes, perhaps,

to
in
to the conclusion that
understand their
their
elders, are cruel
young people, unable and hard

This
is
judgments
but
it
of
them.
not a novel
idea,
author
it is none the less powerful if to the comes afresh and with individual sig-
About it he frames a story which is and illustrate his theme. The story may be humorous or tragic or in a mixed tone of quiet reaHsm. The incidents may be many and various, for innumerable plots might be denificance.
to set forth
signed, all expressive of this single idea.
It is
with the theme that the writer
is
most concerned.

and
this
207
he
tries to
express not in so
many words
as in an abstract moral, but as a living truth
which the reader

it
will
phrase for himself upon
reading the story, just as the writer appreciated
from his observation of life. Innumerable abstract ideas may serve as story texts, preferably such as have come to the writer
his
from
own
observation of
life
though not
necessarily so.
He may,
is
for instance, take the
proverb "honesty
the best policy" and write

thesis.
a story to prove or to disprove the
Or he
you'll
may
choose
Mark Twain^s "be good and
be lonesome," and base thereon a story humorous

or tragic.
Nor need
It
is
the ideas be so abstract or
generahzed.
possible to set forth in story
form, that in the city one loses the interest in

his neighbor
which
is
characteristic of the coun-
try; that in the country one does not appreciate,
as in the city, the sacrifice of selfish interests to
The possible themes are inand each writer will select those which appeal to him most strongly, which seem most true and significant. Once he has selected his theme he invents action wherewith to set it forth, a harmonious setting, and suitable characters. But as the idea was the inception of the story it will dominate his selection throughout, for he
the commonweal.
finite,
will wish,
without phrasing
it
it
in so
many
words,
will
to
make
apparent to the reader, and so
2o8

it
take care not to cloud or confuse
by
irrelevant
or contradictory incidents or characters.

Stories of this type are innumerable,
need
cite
few to
illustrate the point.
and I Maupasenig-
sant's Necklace is
an admirable though
matical example.
I take to
life.
it,
The
author's purpose was,
to reveal his philosophy, his attitude
It
which
out of
may
all
was not a cheerful philosophy, one be summarized in some such fashion

is
as this: Hfe
senselessly tragic, filled with pain

its desert.
measure with
is
It
is
a spec-
tacle to afford
amusement
to a cynical creator;
all is
or perhaps there
signed, a
no creator and
unde-
mere matter
of chance, pain or pleas-
ure dispensed haphazard.
This seems to be the
philosophy back of the story and may, definitely

formulated, have guided Maupassant to the selection of appropriate incident for its expression.
It
is
also possible that
that of the lost necklace

his
notice.
guided in so
to express.
some incident similar to may have come within This he refashioned and shaped, doing by the philosophy he wished
is
It
unlikely that the true incident
bore a close resemblance to the finished story.

It
is
equally unlikely that Maupassant worked
intuitively.
His purpose was, I think, very
clear to him,
it
however much we
may
puzzle over
according to the degree of our understanding.

Illustrations of idea stories
more obvious and

less
209
open to dispute, are such as the following:
Man without a Country, Hawthorne's The Birthmark and The Great Stone Face, Poe's The Purloined Letter, Stevenson's Will 0' the Mill and Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, and Kipling's
Hale's The
Wireless.
Any
story with a clearly recognizable
purpose
is,
of course,
a story of idea
generally
not a good one, for the idea should be so merged
with action that our interest

story for
its
is
absorbed in the
and we feel as we read that we are developing unusual powers of insight and speculation. An idea so expressed that the
sake,
its
own
reader thinks
is
discovery original with himself
one
artistically
conveyed.
In The Necklace
my
interpretation
may
not coincide with yours,

it
for the writer

explicit.
would deem
poor art to be too
But both your idea and mine doubtless

In The
passed through his mind.
Man
without
is
a Country the idea, or in this case the moral,

only too apparent, and the story therefore
fails
somewhat
artistically.
It was, however, a story
with a timely purpose, and the author doubtless
was well to be explicit. Had it it might not have been understood by some for whom it was intended.
thought that
less
it
been
obvious
Stories of emotional effect constitute our fifth
group.
have been somewhat hesitant
of
makbe
ing this classification, for stories of this type
may, with but a
slight stretch of definition,
2IO

Moreover,
all stories
classed as stories of idea.
aim at an emotional
effect,
though
this
may
not
be the sole purpose nor inspire the story.* However, the classification is based on no less an au-
and there is, too, some difference in creative intent and in method between Poe's this class of stories and stories of idea. illustration is The Raven, a poem in which he sought to arouse in the reader an appreciation of beauty tinged with sadness the mood, that is, of
thority than Poe,
gentle melancholy.
He
therefore chose his sub-
ject, selected his incidents, setting,
with this end in view.

intent
similar
and refrain, all method and
may be the story writer's. His initial purpose may be merely to create in the reader an emotion of sentimental content. He will then
select subject-matter
which seems to him appro-
priate:
young
love, spring-time, innocence,
and
trust; or
domestic happiness, the joy of children,

of
and the simple pleasures

creates plot
home
similar things are the materials
These or from which he

life.
and devises characters appropriate to an emotion such as he himself feels as he writes. If his purpose is to arouse horror and fear, his materials may be night and superstition, ghosts and crimes all the materials which create in the reader a fear of the unknown. Again, his mood
his intended effect: the creation of
See chapter XIII, " Unity of Tone."

may
select incidents
211
be ironically humorous, and he will then which will reveal the foibles and
petty shams of humanity, the gulf between reality
and pretence.
or a
The
starting-point for the story

life,
in such a case will
be only an attitude toward
dominant emotion. For the
rest the creation

selec-
of the story will
be a matter of intelligent
tion of appropriate incident, a scant equipment,
seemingly, for a story beginning.

the author
is
In practice
seldom so self-conscious and de-
liberate as has
been intimated.
Rather his
atti-
tude toward hf e leads him unconsciously to select
themes and to devise situations which enable him

to express himself.
The degree
of consciousness
must vary greatly with the writer. Poe seems always to have been aware of what he was doing, and so with some others, the best artists because the most deliberate. Those less aware of their own methods will prove more uneven in quality,
for
not being definitely conscious of their purpose
they are more easily led astray, beguiled by the

imagination to the selection of inappropriate
ments.
ele-
When
the choice
haps, capable of
artists, for
happy they are, perbetter work than the deliberate

is
they give
If
less
the cold effect of de-
is never carried away by his own emotions he cannot hope always to sway his readers.*
signed artistry.
man
See chapter XIII, " Unity of Tone."
212
It

may be
hard to determine with certainty
stories
which originated in the sole design of creating an emotional effect. Poe imdoubtedly so planned various of his tales of horror and mystery, The Black Cat serving, possibly, as an example.
Stevenson
may
sometimes have been so
guided, as in The Suicide Club or The BodySnatcher.
Maupassant, in Moonlight^ was, I The title would seem to indicate that he deliberately contrived a story expressive of the beauty and romance of a moonlight night. This may, of course, be
think, similarly guided.
considered a story illustrative of setting.

further discussion of the place held
tional
A
be
by emo-
purpose
the
in
story-construction will
found in
chapter on ''Unity of Tone.'*

here set forth will suffice for
What we have
the moment.
Let us summarize to
tion.
this point: stories
may
emo-
originate in action, character, scene, idea, or
Whatever may be the germinal impulse,

its
the story should, in

that impulse clear
development, seek to
all else
make
to its
by subordinating
expression and so transforming intention to effect.
A story of action should interest by reason

its
of its incidents
and complications; a story of by revelations of personality; and so with the other forms. Strength and effectiveness are dependent in large part upon the elimicharacter

nation of whatever
is
213
not germane to the writer's
immediate purpose. It is then necessary that he know what that purpose is and make everything
in his story conform to
it.
CHAPTER XI
TITLES
An
little
AND NAMES
title
appropriate and attractive

to
has no
do with the effectiveness of a story.
In
a
recollection, story
and
title
are so associated as
scarcely to be thought of apart.

title is
This being
so,
not to be selected lightly;
we may
say, in-
deed, that a good story can have but one effective
and
suitable
title.
No second choice would be so
good, as a
synonym is never so effective as the one right word in style. But as titles are of all sorts and conditions, we must review some of them to decide upon the principles which determine an appropriate selection. There is, first of all, the title drawn from the
name
Eyre,
of the chief character:
Guy Mannering^
Daniel Deronda,
Adam
,
Bede, Lorna Doone, Jane
Tom Jones and
a host of novels; of short
stories,
jory
Markheim, Ligeia, Colonel StarboUle, MarDaw, Phoebe, Marse Chan, Rip Van Winkle,
and many more. Short stories do not so often take their titles from the names of characters as do long, and the reason is apparent. Whereas a
214
TITLES
novel
AND NAMES
215
may
concern
of a personality
title,
itself with the development and thus appropriately derive its

less,
a short story, attempting
usually can-
not with a just signification take a single

descriptive of its theme.
name as The name would often
imply too much; the story does not attempt to

develop
all of
a character but to set forth a situathat character.
tion in the
life of
A
it is
character
also short;
title is
simple and unpretentious;

virtues.
and these are
It
is
not,
however, highly interesting in

does
it
itself alone,
nor
Once the story is read the title may seem imbued with meaning; then it has value. But unless the name is peculiar or arresting, as Oliver Twist or Martin Chuzzlewit,
arouse curiosity.
it
does not provoke interest.
In a short story,
qualified
is
therefore, the
name
is
more often
and a
situation involving the character
suggested.
Thus we have The Madness
of Private Ortheris,
The Incarnation of Krishna Mulvaney, Tod^s Amendment, The Madness of Phillip, and the like. Such titles are more specific and limited than name alone. They suggest something of the
nature of the story.
most concerned with setting, are often appropriate as titles. Thus of novels: Bleak House, The House of Seven Gables, The House on the Marsh, The House with the
of place,
if
Names
the story
is
Green Shutters, The Mill on the Floss, Middle-
2i6

A Window
Of short
titles of
march, Cranford, The Garden of Allah,

in
Thrums
to
mention but a few.

will suffice:
stories it is
not easy to recall notable
place, but a few
The Merry
Men
(the
reference
is
to the
waves so named breaking on

oj
the reefs), In the House of Suddhoo, The Fall

the
House of Usher, La Grande Breteche, The Great Stone Face, The Beach of Falesd. As in the case of titles drawn from characters, these are memorable
story.
if
the place
is
truly conspicuous in the

if
They arouse
curiosity only
unusual or
suggestive
story.
and seldom
of character
title:
afford a clear clew to the
Names
bined in a
and place may be comHamlet of Shshtchigry County,
The Venus of
Hie,
Lear of
the Steppes
in
all
these the nature of the story is
more or
less clearly
suggested and the

allusive.
title is
in part literary
and
Others: King Solomon of Kentucky,

6*
The Sire de Maletroit^s Door, Will
the Mill,
Rose of Dutcher^s Cooley. In these, presumably, character and place could not easily be dissociated in the author's mind, or merely, the
the place was thought to give the
picturesqueness.
It
is
name of
title
a touch of
not a class which need
detain us long.
Titles such as
Lear of the Steppes are, as was

of
suggested, rather
more than compounds
name
and
place.
They
suggest through allusion some-
TITLES
that
AND NAMES
The best
217
titles,
thing of the nature of the story.

is,
most suggestive and memorable, are, perhaps, those which tell something of the story.
How much
sider later.
the
title
may
safely tell
we
shall con-
We
the
should
first
is
discuss
some
title
of the
means whereby the theme
suggested.
Lear of
Steppes
is
is
a literary
the sigassocia-
nificance of
tions
which
bound up with the

story.
which surround the Lear

such
titles in
There are
Vanity
is
many
English literature.
Fair recalls Pilgrim'' s Progress; Red Pottage

Biblical;
The Mettle of the Pasture is from Shakespeare; Baa Baa Black Sheep and Georgie Porgie are from Mother Goose; The Lie Absolute and Rosemary for Remembrance are from Shakespeare; The Lotos-Eaters, Tennyson; Bread
the Waters,
Upon
Such as Walk in Darkness, and With-
out Benefit of Clergy are

class.
among others of this large
The merit
which
of these is that they are sug-
gestive; the story ciations
is
enriched by the literary asso-
cling to the passage in literature
from which the title is drawn. The story's theme is, too, more or less clearly indicated in so
far as the literary application is
not far-fetched.
litera-
title
which inappropriately draws upon

is,
ture for a false atmosphere
however, insipid by
reason of the pretence.

Stories
the story in
may, in their titles, tell much or little of ways other than allusive The Story
:
2i8
The Taking of the Redoubt, In Each Other^s Shoes, The Phonograph and the Graft, Peter Rugg, the Missing Man, The Attack on the
of a Lie,
Mill,
tian
The Adventures of a
Gellerfs
New
Yearns Eve, Chris-
Last Christmas,
Lover,
Derelict, Youth,
The Unfaithful The End of the Tether, A
Good-for-Nothing, The
The
Man Who
Was, The
Man without a Country, Man Who Would Be
King, The Purloined Letter
all
these
tell
some-
thing of the story, some Httle, some much; they

seek to express the theme of the story, to catch
the gist of
it
in a phrase.
There
is
no question
certain also
that they are appropriate; but

that they are of uneven merit.
it is
The
less excellent,
such as The Adventures of a

tell
New
Year's Eve, apparently

if
too much.
The
been
reader turns to a story
his curiosity has
piqued by the
title,
but
is
uninterested
if
told too
is,
much.
Such a
title
as
The
Man Who Was
however, provocative of curiosity.

of the story's
Something
theme
is
surmised, but only enough
to
fied.
prompt a reading that the guess may be veriThe Man without a Country, on the other
is explicit,
hand,
but
is
so surprising in itself that
we wish
Club.
less,
to discover the explanation,
and
there-
fore read the story.
So, too, with TJte Suicide
The
title is explicit,
but serves, none the
to arouse curiosity.
title,
We may
generalize
its
thus much: a good
though accurate in
TITLES
AND NAMES
219
definition of the story's theme, is so phrased as
to excite attention and curiosity. If it were no more than a label for goods, the writer only a shopman, it would be well to provide an attractive announcement for the stimulation of trade.
And
even though the story prove not so interest-
ling as the
name
implies, the reader will forgive

of his anticipatory thrill
the deception
by reason
though I do remember, as a boy, being much
misled by a novel entitled Slings and Arrows,
which, to
my
huge disappointment, had nothing

place or those which define
all.
to do with battles.
Titles of
name and
the story theme are not, however,

are to be found
in literature.
stractly,
There
is
at least one other class of importance, and in this
some
of the
most
effective titles
They do not label but instead name some
the theme abspecific object
around which the story centres.
They
are prob-
ably most effective in retrospect, for the story
must be read
Scarlet Letter,
to invest
them with meaning; but

The Necklace, The
they are forever memorable.
The Moonstone, The Black Pearl, The Piece of String, The Monkeys Paw, The Gold
Bug
the stories which these suggest come vivmind

as one reads the
list.
idly to
It is
hard to
believe that they
had not always
this significance;
yet though sufficiently inviting, they cannot have

exerted so powerful a hold upon the imagination
220

the story
when
spect.
was yet
is
to read as
now
in retro-
Durability
is
their great virtue. for the success of

it
There
titles
an excellent reason
is
such as these.
Literature, though
deals
with ideas and emotions,

crete rather than abstract. in
best
when
it is
con-
Maupassant's theme
The Necklace may be the irony of chance; but his philosophy is not abstractly put; it is
told in terms of
is
human
experience;
its
substance
of
the concrete fact of Hfe.

is
The tragedy
title is
The
Necklace
summed up
in the jewel itself
which
doubly
was
paste.
Therefore the story's
effective in that it recalls
something which ap-
peals to the senses of touch
and
vision,
and which
So, too,
title.
also symbolizes the idea of the story.
with The Scarlet
Letter,
most admirable
The glowing symbol

The
of Hester's sin is the best
possible device wherewith to label the story.

Scarlet Letter, moreover, is highly provoca-
tive of curiosity.
Concrete
titles,
names
of objects, are, then,
possessed of a double appeal.
When
they are
both suggestive and inviting they would seem to
meet all requirements of a perfect title. But we must not conclude that all good titles are of this
class.
its
Kipling's Without Benefit of Clergy, with

is
neat misuse of a phrase,

So, too,
is
both inviting and
memorable.
the
title
They of what
is,
perhaps, ELipling's masterpiece of suggestion.
It
TITLES
is
AND NAMES
title,
221
a puzzling, enigmatical
one which comIn retrospect

it
mands a reading
gotten.
of the story.
it
seems highly appropriate, nor can

titles as in stories.
ever be for-
There must be individual preferences in Each one of us recalls this one or that The Scarlet Letter, The Lady or the Tiger, The Outcasts of Poker Flat, They, The Gold
some reason impressed him Yet any selected more of the desirable will, I think, possess one or And all, qualities of which we have spoken. without exception, will be short. The day of the Seldom more than long and double title is past. five words are permissible, and four or three are
Bug
which has
for
as appropriate and effective.
yet better.
or two.
Many
notable
titles
are of but one
The
practice permits, seemingly, of few
or no exceptions.
be well before we leave the subject to note the titles of some of the fairy tales which
It
may
have persisted
for generations.
The
fairy story,
we observed
at the outset of our study,
was wor-
thy of careful examination, for a story which survives generations of oral tradition
to
is
pretty sure
be effective and polished narrative.
The
must have been worn smooth of all They have, perhaps, even changed superfluities. and but the best survived. There are such as
titles, too,
Cinderella
or
the
Crystal
Slipper
sometimes
Snow-White,
either singly, Jack
and
the Beanstalk,
222

y
Blue-Beard, Beauty and the Beast Sleeping Beauty,
The Babes in
the
Wood
all
are
memorable and
arresting; all are short.
Names of Characters
of the seventeenth and and even later, it was customary to designate the dominant attribute of the story's characters by means of the name chosen. There are such as Mr. Worldly Wise-
In the novels and plays
eighteenth centuries
man, Allworthy, Squire Western, Mrs. Millamant, and Snake. These are too obvious for our modern taste, and the custom has pretty well dropped in literature. Yet Dickens, Meredith, and Hardy at times employ modifications of the device, and Dickens often closely approaches his
predecessors of the early days of the novel.
v^
The
Cheeryble brothers suggest only too openly gentlemen of a cheery disposition. Meredith, too, in
The
Egoist, sees
fit
to call his hero Sir
Willoughby
Patterne, a
name
clearly indicative of character.
Hardy
selects for
one of his rustics such a name
as Gabriel Oake.
Names may undoubtedly be made highly indicative of character without too openly defining
it.
Dickens,
who
for
is
at times too obvious,
is
also
often inimitably successful.

ideal
v/
name
an
erratic
Mr. Micawber is an and humorous charac-
ter.
Nicholas Nickleby seems in keeping with
TITLES
man; and
sniff,
AND NAMES
223
the energetic and care-free nature of that young

Silas
Wegg, Uriah Heep, Mr, PeckPickall excellent.
Sairey
Gamp, Samuel Weller, and Mr.
wick, though uneven in quality, are
Why
is it
that a
name seems
appropriate?
Do
sig-
the qualities of character as revealed in the story

so color
it
that for this reason alone
it
seems
nificant?
Or is
there a subtler reason?
As an extreme instance of an artfully contrived name, let us examine Poe's Ligeia. The sound of This is due it is suggestive of grief and sadness. to the associations which cluster about the sounds of which it is composed, for Ligeia is but a rearrangement of the letters which compose The associations of this word uncon^* elegy." sciously surround the name Ligeia and give it
color.
are humorous in their connotation.
Certain sounds, singly or in combination, Thus " q,"

its
perhaps because of
association with "queer,"
suggests something odd.
few of
my
readers
may
It
is
recall
a once-noted book entitled Queechy.
a beautifully absurd name, suggestive of wet
weather and goloshes.
But though
the heroine,
Queechy, was
much
given to tears, the author did
not, I fancy, intend the suggestion.
The
associations of sounds
and
their
power of
Certain
suggestion usually elude exact analysis.
combinations of letters are absurd, others dignified,
and yet others
poetic.
sensitive ear de-
224

even though
it
tects the suggestion,

it.
cannot define
The careful author, aUve to names which harmonize with his

less
this fact, seeks
characters; the
if
obvious the harmony, the better,
the effect
be gained.
Dickens possessed an ear usually
trustworthy and sought the desired
name
until
he found
it.
Aside from the
less definable, suggestive
power
of sounds, are associations less difficult to grasp.
I once read a story of which the heroine was
named Miss Dill, unhappily suggestive of pickles.
tragic or grave tone
would be
difficult
to
maintain were the hero named Juggins or Tootle.

These, appropriate to farce-comedy, are, because
of their associations, for
some reason absurd.

though
Names
subtly appropriate to character may, in-
deed, not be
demanded
of every story,
never amiss; but the author should seek to render
them
at least innocuous,
and
in so far as possible
devoid of incongruous associations.
That names
in
sound and suggestion should
harmonize with the characters and the story theme is, however, but the half of the obligation.
Names
lations;
are
much more than
individual appelclass.
they are indicative of race and

racial
Schmidt, Ryan, and Sobieski, Warren, Lee, and
Alden are names of

Silas
and sectional import.
Lapham
and
is
appropriate to a Yankee of long
descent,
either close to the soil or but a sin-
TITLES
gle
AND NAMES
225
remove from
it.
Clara Middleton and Eliza-
beth Bennett are names appropriate to middleclass heroines.
Lovelace suggests the cavalier,
and is suited
TuUiver
is
either to a villain or a hero.
Maggie
name
applicable to a rustic maiden
of the lower middle class.
Given names, as well as surnames, are

suggestive quahties
real life
rich in
by reason
of characters in
and
in fiction
with which these names are
Priscilla suggest modest maidens of Puritan origin. Mary is a name denot-
associated.
Dorcas and
and honesty, as, too, is John. Claude and Percival suggest to me erratic and unreliable characters. Muriel, Gwendolyn, and Gladys are appropriate to fashionable maidens of the British aristocracy. Oliver, Henry, Susan, and Ruth are names which I associate with solid charing virtue
acters, devoid of affectation.
It
is
certain that
names are colored for each of us by our individual associations, and it is hkewise true that we know many a man and woman inappropriately named. Parents are unreliable in these matters, and too often afSict commonplace offspring with fanciful names. Nevertheless, there is some common
basis of consent as to the significance of
many
names, and
this the writer
should take into ac-
count as he labels his characters.
Perhaps
it is
fear of the danger
which waits
upon unusual names that leads many present-day
226

to
writers
employ them sparingly.

his creations
Neutral
names take on the characteristics with which the

writer
safe.
endows
and
are, therefore,
Kipling and others not infrequently enthe heroes of romantic stories with prosaic
effect of greater
dow
names, achieving thereby 'an

credibihty and realism.
When Thomas Smith
meets romantic experiences we are inclined to beNote that in Without Benefit lieve them true.
of Clergy the hero
is
named,
prosaically,
is
John
to
Holden.
which,
The
girl,
however,
named Ameera,
significance,
whatever
its
Oriental
Western
ears suggests love.
We
cannot, therefore, lay
down any hard-and-
fast principles in this
matter of nomenclature.
It will suffice to point out that
suggestions of character,
names convey dim and arouse congruous
or incongruous associations
by reason
of
the
soimds of which they are composed.

varying with the individual experience.
careful writer bears these points in
Given
names, too, are enriched by associations, these
The
as he
mind
seeks
names appropriate
to his creations, seek-
ing at least to avoid the incongruous.
CHAPTER
XII
SUGGESTION AND RESTRAINT

It
is
a limitation of painting and sculpture, as
static arts, that they
cannot portray motion.

it;
They
can, however, suggest
for,
as
Rodin
points out, a statue may, in
its
pose, combine
two successive attitudes and thus suggest the transition from the one to the other which we call motion. Great sculpture, though fashioned of inert stone, may in this way be suggestive of life and movement; and a great picture may do as much. Were one to turn his eyes away for an instant the statue or portrait might, one believes,
in that
moment
of inattention alter its pose.

is
Literature, too,
subject to limitations which
are also its opportunities for effective artistry.

It is a temporal art,
moving, that
is
to say, in
it
time, as does music.
Unlike painting,
cannot
set before us as a single impressicm a number of persons and objects in relation one to another.
This we have seen to be one of the difficulties which description has to evade. Moreover, if the
story
is
short,
one of but a few thousand words,

227
228
it
can set forth only a lunited number of charac-
and incidents and these so swiftly that but elaboration is possible. That careful selection may overcome the difficulty somewhat has been shown in preceding chapters; economy of action, speech, time, and place may do much in little to suggest the complexity and richness of
ters
little
Hfe.
We should do well at this point to sum up what

we have
learned thus far and to develop certain
associated principles.
treat of suggestion first as a
For convenience we will group of mechanical

So to
devices designed for swift effects, and, second, as
an
artistic principle of
is
wider implications.
arbitrary,
divide the subject
but the gain to
clearness will justify the method.
We
must,
first of all,
it is
define
what we mean by
an invitation to the reader to collaborate in the creation of the story. Art is two-sided, needing one to make and the other to appreciate; one to write and the other to understand. The writer seeks, by whatsoever means he may, to enlist the activities of the reader in his behalf. These activities are of the imagination based upon experience. The reader devoid of imagination can understand only the most obsuggestion:
vious writing.
The
all
reader lacking in experience
cannot supply
child
that the writer requires, as a
must
fail
to understand the true relations of

men and women.
imagination
is,
229
An
appeal to experience and

is
then,
what
meant by the term
"suggestion.'*
Intensification by Suggestion
mands
full
more mechanical aspects suggestion demore explicit than is compatible with clearness. If a hint is enough, a
In
its
that the writer be no
statement
is
superfluous and serves but to
bore the reader.

ber,
This principle, you
will
remem-
was touched upon
in our earlier analysis of
description, characterization, dialogue,

sition.
and expo-
Moreover, when hints

is
suffice for elabo-
rate statements, not only
there great saving of
space, but the appeal to the reader's intelligence,

if
deftly made, does
much
to stimulate that sense
of intellectual satisfaction wherein lies
much
of
the pleasure of reading.
Nowhere
is this
more
oft-
obvious than in an artful ending.

cited Necklace of
In the
Maupassant the story ends with the heroine's discovery that the jewel was of There is no statement of after events and paste.
whatever compensation there
years.
may be
for
wasted
So,
This would be superfluous, an anticlimax.
The
reader
may
imagine this for himself.
too, of
a love story.
We
need no description of
the wedding to assure ourselves that the
young
people were legally married, that one of them did
ôt die of heart-disease on the morning previous,
230

line of future
is
or the other suffer a cautious second thought.
Once the
development
is
clearly in-
dicated the story
done.
With the exposition and description at the outThe writer's set a like economy may be effected.
object
is
to get the essentials to clearness before
the reader as swiftly as possible.
There are
all
sorts of relevant but superfluous disclosures from
which he refrains. In the first paragraphs of Matkheim, earher quoted for its character-drawing and exposition, will be found a good illustration of this compactness, this freedom from the
superfluous,
and dependence upon the reader's

a hint.
ability to grasp
It
would seem that writers generally might be

Thus,
if
quicker than they are to utilize the obvious tricks

of suggestion.
'*
mention Mendelssohn's
v/
man at
Wedding March " and an expectant clergythe altar I need not add that a wedding is
If
in prospect, the scene a church.
Smith, bear-
ing a valise freshly stuck with labels, walks up the
yy
street with
an
air at
once confident and curious,

to
may
infer that
Smith has returned
town after
little
a considerable absence.
In a thousand
ways the
skilled writer
may
guide his readers to
their own deductions and, while effecting an economy of space, confer pleasure upon them in so doing. Yet there is relatively httle of this swift and confident style. Only good writers seem to

possess
it
231
and not
all of
them, for writers there
are whose substance interests despite defective artistry.

tors of
Doubtless the vicious habit of edi-
paying a fixed rate per word rather than a dependent upon compactness and intensity price
has
much
to
do with the prevailing cult of wordiCertainly nine-tenths of
ness and obviousness.

creditable short stories
cutting
away
superfluities
might be improved by and by the substituClearness

is,
tion of suggestion for explanation.
^
'^
and must not be sacwhose suggestive short cuts in style are worthy the study of any writer, is sometimes rather obscure by reason of overcomhowever, the
first essential
rificed.
Kipling,
pression.
A
tion,
which
happy compromise between obviousness, is tedious, and overrefinement of suggesis
which
obscure,
may be found in Kipling's

deftly suggested than
is
story They.
More
is
openly stated, as befits a story of the supernatural in
be
which the imagination of the reader must the author's reliance for conviction and
acceptance.
To wrench certain of the suggestive

is,
passages from their context

barous, and to appreciate
of course, bar-
them
in their full excel-
lence the story should be read as a whole.

ever, a
Howevident
few instances
will serve to
make
exactly
what
is
meant by suggestion
in our first
application of the term.
232
The story recounts three motor visits to a beauold house deep hidden in woods. The narrator, chancing upon the place and taken with its
tiful
beauty, sees at a distance, in the garden and at

the windows of the house, children,
shy curiosity at the motor-car,
who gaze in but who do not

mistress of the
come
place.
near.
blind
woman
is
Her manner of speaking of the children is strange, as when she says, "They really are fond of me" this when they do not come near.
Again, speaking of the inability to see the beloved dead in dreams: " Then it must be as bad as
being blind."
visitor
The
butler, too,
who
sets
the
upon the right road when he departs, asks if he saw the children before the mistress of the house appeared. Why should her presence be necessary, we wonder, and why are the children
so shy?
Is she their
mother?
On the second visit, the woman, when asked how many children there are, replies: "I don*t
quite know; sometimes more
and sometimes less."

strange
It seems, too, that she possesses the
psychic power of perceiving the

is
human aura and

Later she
is
sensitive to the colors of
it.
as-
tonished that the visitor does not understand
something,
we do not
is
learn what, relating to
the children.
because
it
She says he will come again, his right, and "will walk in the
butler, it seems, has lost a child,
wood."
The

children.
233
of
and other incidents touch upon the death
On
the third and last visit the scene
is
within
doors mostly.
The
beautiful old house
is filled
with things to dehght children, but though the

mistress calls
them they
are
still
shy and
will
not
come near.
tenant farmer, greatly and unac-
countably frightened, seeks an interview with the

lady of the manor.
The
is
fireplace of the
.
without iron (iron
hostile to spirits)
room is Then by
fore-
a sign the
visitor recognizes the presence of his
own dead
shadowed
child
is
and what has been plainly
fully explicable.
The blind woman,
children but who had none of her own, had by her psychic power and the strength of her
who loved
longing called the spirits of dead children to be
her consolation.
I
have not given a half
of
is
the suggestive
touches by which the story
built up.
At no
*^
place, moreover, does the story baldly explain,
even at the
the
lines.
last.
The
reader
is
must look between
And
the result
stirs
a story wonderfully
affecting,
one which
the imagination to en-
dow
all
the narrative with a pathos which touches
experience of loss.
Restraint
This story
will serve to
launch our discussion
upon a second
principle of suggestion, that of re-
234

The emotion
of the visitor
straint.
who
sees the
dead child is touching, because onlyhinted at. There is no parade of emotion, no words to explain it; for no words are adequate.
spirit of his
Great literature in
its
moments
of intensity
its feeling.
must
needs only suggest, not proclaim,
We
distrust eloquence at such a time, for eloquence

is
calculated to an effect, and when a man is swept with passion he cannot master himself to
adequate expression.
A simple suggestion is far
more
on that the reader will build, supplying from experience and imagination what no words could convey. Restraint is effective in a hundred ways, but
effective, for
particularly in all portrayal of intense emotion.

If the
words which could most powerfully

it is far
set
forth the emotion are inadequate,

ter
bet-
not to attempt even these and to undershoot
The inadequacy of stammering and broken words, or of simple and unpretentious

the mark.
statement
will, of itself, force
the reader to supply
in imagination
if
he has
it
what
by
the author
deemed
it
impossible to convey
direct means.
gesture, even, or the description of facial ex-
pression,
may
be better than any attempt at
words, as a hand clasp or a glance
may
express
sympathy more
elaborate speech.
certainly
than eloquent and
ature
attests.
That this is so all great literThus Macduff, when news is
235
brought him of wife and children slain by Macbeth, "He has no children!" In Henry Esmond
the quarrel of
fine
Esmond and
the Pretender
is
example; and again, in Vanity Fair, the scene

surprises
which Rawdon Crawley Lord Steyne.

in
Becky and
Restraint
may be likened
to control in singing.
The
knows just how far he can crowd his voice in pitch and volume and never permits himself to go so far. The result is,
great tenor at the opera
that though he
is
doing almost
all of
which he
is
capable, he seems to be holding himself in check,

to be capable of yet higher notes
and a
still
greater
volume
of tone.
The
less artful singer
pushes himself to the utmost, and the hearer is on

tenter-hooks lest the voice break utterly.
sense conveyed of
The
power
is
in reserve, of resources
dehberately ignored,
the quality of restraint.
and the great writers in most commanding utterances are thus, seemingly, most simple and imforced.
It gives strength to style,
their
Enlargement by Suggestion
In our analysis of restraint we have passed beyond the merely mechanical aspects of suggestion, that is of compressed utterance, and entered a larger field. Suggestion in its broader impUcations
employs devices some of which we should
consider in detail.
236

and
If the writer, in his selection of incidents
in their narration, can stimulate the reader to
imagine untold incidents, he has then been suggestive in the fullest

det^s story
meaning of the term. DauThe Siege of Berlin will serve to illus-
trate the point.

of the First
The
story concerns a veteran

of the first
Empire who, upon news

is
disaster of the Franco-Prussian War,
prostrated
and seems upon the point
of death.
To make
and the
possible his recovery, his granddaughter
doctor combine to deceive him as to the true

course of events.
war and
fabricate letters
the front.
They manufacture news of the from his son, who is at France, instead of being overrun by
is
an invading army,
while Paris
is
herself the invader, and,
besieged, the old colonel imagines
BerHn
all
but taken:
"It was necessary to keep him au courant with the movements of the army and to invent mihtary bulletins. It was pitiful to see that beautiful girl bending night and day over her map of Ger-
many, marking it with little flags, forcing herself to combine the whole of a glorious campaign Bazaine on the road to BerHn, Frossard in Bavaria,
MacMahon on
asked
my
counsel,
it
could, but
the Baltic. In all this she I helped her as far as I was the grandfather who did the
and
imaginary invasion. He had conquered Germany so often during the First Empire. He knew all the moves beforehand.
most
for us in this

'Now
ized,
237
they should go there.
will do,'
and
his anticipations
This is what they were always realUnfortunately,
not a
little to his pride.
we
might take towns and gain battles, but we never went fast enough for the Colonel. He was insatiable. Every day I was greeted with a fresh
feat of arms.
'"Doctor,
young
girl,
ing smile, voice crying: *" We are getting on, we are getting on. In a week we shall enter Berlin.' ''At that moment the Prussians were but a
we have taken Mayence,' said the coming to meet me with a heartrendand through the door I heard a joyous
week from
Paris.
"From
that day our military operations besimpler.
came much
Taking Berhn was merely Every now and then, when the old man was tired of waiting, a letter from his son was read to him an imaginary letter, of course, as nothing could enter Paris, and as, since Sedan, MacMahon's aide-de-camp had been sent to a German fortress. Can you not imagine the
a matter of patience.
despair of the poor

father,
all
girl,
without tidings of her
knowing him
to be a prisoner, deprived of
him speak
comforts, perhaps ill, and yet obHged to make in cheerful letters, somewhat short, as from a soldier in the field, always advancing in a conquered country. Sometimes, when the inva-
lid
fresh news.
sleep,
was weaker than usual, weeks passed without But was he anxious and unable to
suddenly a
letter arrived
from Germany
which she read gayly at
his bedside, struggling
238

tears.
hard with her
The
ligiously, smiling
with an
air of superiority,
Colonel listened reap-
proving, criticising, explaining, but it was in his answers to his son that he was at his best. * Never forget that you are a Frenchman,' he wrote; 'be generous to those poor people. Do not make the invasion too hard for them.' His advice was never ending; edifying sermons about respect of property, the politeness due to ladies, in short, quite a code of military honor for the
use of conquerors. With all this he put in some general reflections on politics and the conditions of peace to be imposed on the vanquished. With regard to the latter, I must say he was not exacting:
*The war indemnity and nothing else. It is no good to take provinces. Can one turn Ger**
many
into France?
'
Little is told of the siege of Paris, only a detail
now and
then, sufficient to keep before the reader
the suppressed background of reality.
As the
veteran, in his comfortable room, follows the suc-
French invaders, the reader supphes in imagination the privations which are encesses of the
dured close at hand with the French, not the

Prussians, the sufferers.
The
effect is curiously
powerful and graphic, and due solely to the imagination, guided, of course,
whom
than to
the scenes untold are

us.
by the writer, to even more vivid
Yet one must needs be a good reader
to get the full force of the story.

ulation
239
Suggestion may, too, open up avenues of spec-
by touching upon
incidents
and
relations
antecedent or auxiliary to the story proper.

story then becomes the centre of interest
several or
effect of
The among
it
many scenes, and

of life itself.
there
is
given to
the
being but an incident taken from a larger
whole
effect
that
The
story gains in
no longer seems a detached, complete, and unrelated thing but a

for it
immensely thereby,
part, one of
many parts,
of experience as a whole.
This does not contravene any principle of unity,

for it
may
be a complete and harmonious whole,

larger whole.
If this apit is,
and yet suggest the

pears paradoxical
of the
as
we have
seen,
but one
many
let
paradoxes, such as the dual time
scheme, which the art of fiction embraces.
But
us consider specific illustrations to

apparent.
I recall a story of
make our meaning
Bunner's, Our Aromatic Uncle, which illustrates

the point in simple fashion.
It
is
of a rich
China
merchant,
who
seeks his
nephew and
niece
whom
he has never seen. In the end it turns out that he is not the uncle at all, but the butcher boy who admired him and who ran away to sea
with him.
this
With
these youthful adventures the
story has not directly to do, but the hints of
antecedent action envelop the story with a
romantic atmosphere.
The
reader speculates
is
upon the story suggested, and thereby
the
240

made
a part of a
written story enriclied and

larger whole.
Hints of previous action in which the characters
have participated
may
often be legitimately
given in dialogue and without obscuring the im-
mediate purpose in hand.

exposition
Or the author
in his
may
give the clew.
Kipling, in his
earlier work, often
a second story
dismissing
story."
it
made use of the device of citing by way of illustration, and then

is
with the words ^'but that

this instance the device
another
In
becomes a
mere
trick,
but the purpose of creating atmosis
phere by suggestion
sound.
is
Another device, similar in kind,

writer
that of the
generalized or philosophical introduction.
The
makes a comment upon

tells his
life,
phrasing a
generalization which he believes universally true.
He
ical,
then
story as a specific incident in
point.
The
story thus seems to be broadly typ-
its significance
not of
itself
it.
alone but of
many
another instance like
Kipling, Turgenieff,
Maupassant, and other good writers re-
sort sometimes to this expedient to weight their
narratives with suggestive power.
That the author may

ever,
successfully charge his

it is necessary, howmore incident than he
story with suggestive hints,
that he imagine
actually incorporates in his story.
He
should so
have imagined characters, so created circum-

story proper that he can refer to
effort in passing,
241
-
stances antecedent to and coincident with the
tion
them without and without distracting attenfrom incidents which the reader should
weigh.
Not
otherwise can the hints dropped

will
seem natural and unforced, nor

proper emphasis be possible.
unity and
*^
The
story can be
life is
made a
grasped.
cross-section of
life
only as
really
Pretence and sham will be apparent. The introductory paragraphs of Bourget's
story Another Gambler will serve to illustrate this
wealth of story material suggested, but not

rectly utilized:
di-
"Though he was your cousin,"

after reading a telegram
I said to Claude which he handed to me,
surely cannot grieve for his death. He has on himself and I did not expect it of him. His suicide spares your old uncle the scandal of a shocking trial. But what a history!
"you
done
justice
That
woman murdered merely for the sake of her trumpery savings! To come to such an end, through degradation after degradation he whom
old
I see him provincial
we once knew so proud, so elegant! now when he first arrived in our old
of artillery.
town, just after he had been appointed lieutenant We followed him in the streets with such boyish pride. He was twenty-seven, and you were not a third of his age. Ah, well, in spite of all ^poor, poor Lucien!"
With the
story
is
incidents thus briefly outlined
tJie
not concerned, save in this suggestive
242

outcome
of the
fashion; these are the indirect
story incidents yet to be related.
Who
any
the old
woman
tail.
was, the manner of her death, and the
theft of her
money
are not given in
fuller de-
inal
But from what we learn later of the crimwe are at liberty to speculate and devise whatsoever stories we please.
Selection of setting, character,
and
incident, all
have their place in imparting that larger significance to a story which

is
embraced
in the
mean-
ing of our term ''suggestion,"

peculiar, the setting remote,
bizarre, the less likehhood
is
If the action is
and the characters

there that the story
possess a significance wider than that explicit in
the action.
it selects
Art attempts to universalize; that

characters, situations, emotions,
is,
and
ideas which touch our experience closely at

points.
tic
many
We say of
a story that
it is it is
characteris-
or true
characteristic in that
we
life,
representa-
tive of life
and implies more than
it tells.
But
these implications
ourselves supply from our
own
peal.
experience of
though the writer must,
of course, touch our latent
memories by
artful ap-
Herein
and detailed commonplace

bered, are
Itself.
much of the power of a quiet realism. The little familiar touches,

lies
in themselves, serve to recall
our
experiences of a Hke kind, which, thus
remem-
It
is
somehow more pleasant than reality as though we were but suddenly

awakened
to the true flavor of
life,
243
which we had done but dealing with a manner of life or emotion utterly foreign to us make no such appeal; hence
not realized before.
Stories equally well
the difficulty of appreciating the literature of a

foreign people, unless the writer
to
is
so universal as
make
the differences of experience less signifi-
cant than the resemblances.
Bjornson, for ex-
ample, I read with

sequently
little
understanding, and con-
little interest.
Tolstoy and Turgenieff

they bring
however, I find
intelligible, for
home
the likenesses of people rather than racial differ-
ences of custom and emotion.

versal,
Being thus uni-
they are interesting, for the life which they

is
reveal
fundamentally
like that I
know.
is
if
In
this
chapter I have touched only upon cer-
tain fairly obvious devices
whereby suggestion
clear its object
attained.
I trust I
have made
nothing more. It seeks to enrich the story, which
must perforce deal with but few and selected incidents, by stimulating the imagination of the reader to the elaboration of other incidents and stories antecedent, coincident, and subsequent.
In so doing
of Ufe.
it
relates the story to the larger
whole
.J
-v^
CHAPTER
XIII
UNITY OF TONE
Many of my readers will, I am sure, have taken
exception
to
this
or that generalization laid
down They
or
as fundamental to a sound story technic.

will
have had in mind certain

artistic
fine stories
which violate the unities of action, time, or place,
commit other
misdemeanors, and are
nevertheless vital
and
effective pieces of writing,
superior to academic rules
and precepts.
Yet our
generalizations are sound in the main; safe guides

for the writer
who
is
learning his craft, and the
exceptions themselves obey a higher law which
we have now
to define.
"Unity
of
Tone"
is
the
term employed to designate the highest degree of

story effectiveness, and
late
some stories which vioan accepted principle of structure possess this compensating virtue. But it is a term which, though critically useful, is vague, and demands
careful explanation.
By
unity of tone
is
meant a harmony
of parts
incidents, characters, speech, place, and emotionwhich has as result singleness of imits
244
UNITY OF TONE
pression.
245
The
reader recalls not so
much
the in-
cidents of the story as the totality of its effect
upon him.
emotion
its
It aroused in
fear,
him a single dominant sympathy, kindliness, irony, peslike.
simism, and the
This
it
did because
all of
energies were directed to that end, the author,

to
dominated by the emotion which he sought

this object in view.
arouse in his readers, selecting his materials with
This emotional intent of
the author
may
be said to overlay or envelop
his simple story purpose, that of recounting action, of picturing character or place, or of con-
veying an abstract idea.
That
is
to say,
if
write a story of action, I select
my
incidents to
make my story interesting and effective; but I am

further guided
by an emotion which
leads
select a certain
kind of incident from the
me to many
incidents possible, a kind in
harmony with
my
emotion.
have really two purposes here which
I endeavor to harmonize.
If I
am
successful in
my
attempt to reconcile
is
emotion and selection, there
every chance that

If I fail,
my
story will be convincing.
my story
its re-
will certainly lack
"unity of tone" and

I have,
sultant ''unity of impression."

specific to
Let us be more
make
the point clear.
we
will
say, resolved to write a story of exciting incident,
an adventure story. I select appropriate incidents and endeavor to combine them into an
246

I feel, however,
effective whole.
no great enthuas I
siasm for this sort of thing,

nize its merits.
ferent sort.
much
may recogof a dif-
My
temperament
is
is
Action that
If I
of interest to
me
is
action which reveals character, not action for
its
own
sake.
am not in
emotional accord with
my
proposed story the result will be one of two
my story will change under my hands and become something different from what I intend, or I may stick to my original purpose and the story become limp and nerveless; more
things: either
technically, it will lack conviction,
my
emotion
being in opposition to
is
my
theme.
This discord
at the root of the failure of
many
a story writ-
ten
by a competent author whose heart was not
in his work.
The
story does not convince; this
means more
tion in
explicitly that the
author in his
se-
lection of materials
was not so guided by an emohis story
harmony with
purpose that he
selected always the right incidents; or his story
became a mere
exercise devoid of enthusiasm,
uninteresting to him,
and hence,
in
ways unacex-
countable, uninteresting to his readers.

Scott,
Dumas, and Stevenson have written
cellent stories of adventure, for they delighted in
action.
selves.
Their stories are of a kind with them-
We cannot imagine any one of them writLapham,

excellent stories
ing The Mill on the Floss, or Pride and Prejudicey

or The Rise of Silas
UNITY OF TONE
but utterly
different in kind
247
from Ivanhoe, The

Excellence
Three Musketeers, and Kidnapped.
depends not so much upon the kind of subject

selected as
terest.
upon
sincerity
and genuineness
of in-
Great stories can be written of a dozen
different types provided the writer
have an en-
thusiasm
is
for his
work, for his interest or lack of it
bound to show to animate his work, to confuse and perplex it, or, again, to leave it inert and
dead.
He
is
fortunate
who
early finds the kind
can do best, which arouses his genuine interest, and who tries to do nothing else. Unity of tone demands, then, that the emotion
of thing he
and thus his purpose, be in harEmotion is not, of course, mony with sufficient in itself, though essential, for it must be supplemented by good judgment and an adeof the writer,
his theme.
quate technic.
It
is
here that our
comment
can be made definite and helpful, for we deal with nothing so intangible as emotional states,
but with definite incidents which we may examine and whose suitabiHty to their purpose
we can
weigh.
initial illustration,
Let us consider, as an
the
rationalized story of the supernatural.
The writer
here suffers from a conflict of emotions.

izes
He realof
that the supernatural
is
possessed
powerful appeal and of this he desires to avail himself. He does not, however, believe in the
248
supernatural
in
ghosts,
or
is
premonitions,
or
spirit-communications
nor
he able to lend
is
himself in imagination to such a belief. Therefore
he devises a situation which

only by
recourse
to
apparently-
explicable
agencies,
supernatural
his
and at the end, having wrought
readers to a pitch of superstitious emotion, pro-
ceeds to
plicable
stories I
show that all the phenomena are exby perfectly natural agencies. In such
am
conscious always of a distinct disapjusti-
pointment which I believe to be perfectly

fied
and due to a
it
fault in the writing.
The
story
purporting to deal with the supernatural, I lend
myself to
ditions.
and, in imagination, yield to
its
con-
I thus
am in accord with its tone. But

it
when in its
I
solution
becomes perfectly rational,
am at a loss, and conscious of being tricked. It is not that I am really a believer in the supernatural, but that I am quite ready to pretend to
such a belief as the condition of the story, and
in that imaginary belief I take pleasure.
The
writer has
made
the mistake of selecting two di-
verse and incompatible orders of incident, the
supernatural and the natural.
These
will
not
harmonize, and the result
is failure.
The
take.
great story writers do not
make
this mis-
Mr. Henry James, who delights
in quiet
who is rational and free from superstition, nevertheless, in such a story

psychological studies,
UNITY OF TONE
249
as The Turn of the Screw, lays aside his natural maimer and tells his ghost-story, with its horrors and its apparitions, as though it were true. He makes no attempt to rationalize it, for it is
frankly in the realm of the inexplicable.
So, too,
Poe, Maupassant, and Kipling in their stories of

the supernatural are never misled to an explana-
ling in
say never, but I recall a story of Kipwhich the ghostly noises are traceable to the wind blowing through a knot-hole or someThe story is fiat, and I recall thing of the sort.
tion.
no other instance in Kipling of a like failure. FicThe ghost tion is governed by laws of its own. in Hamlet may not coincide with our scientific conceptions of the universe, but in Hamlet it is true, and we lend our imaginations to it and believe
it.
The
story
failure of the writer to
remain true to the

of the super-
tone which he establishes at the outset of his

is
of
Uke kind with the misuse
natural.
tragedy should begin as a tragedy, a
comedy
in the light
manner appropriate
to
it.
In one of Stevenson's
letters to Barrie occurs
comment
.
in point:
The
all
Little
Minister ought to have ended badly;
it did; and we are infinitely grateful you for the grace and good feeling with which you hed about it. If you had told the truth, I As you for one could never have forgiven you.
we
to
know
250
had conceived and written the earlier parts, the truth about the end, though indisputably true to fact, would have been a he, or what is worse, a If you are going to make a book discord in art. end badly, it must end badly from the beginning. Now your book began to end well. You let yourself fall in love with, and fondle, and smile at your puppets. Once you had done that your honor was committed at the cost of truth to life you were bound to save them. It is the blot on
Richard Fever el, for instance, that it begins to end But in well; and then tricks you and ends ill. that case there is worse behind, for the ill-ending does not inherently issue from the plot the story had, in fact, ended well after the last great interview between Richard and Lucy and the bUnd, illogical bullet which smashes all has no more to do between the boards than a fly has to do with the room into whose open window it comes buzzing. It might have so happened; it needed not; and unless needs must, we have no I have had a heavy right to pain our readers. case of conscience of the same kind about my Braxfield only his name is Braxfield story. Hermiston has a son who is condemned to death; plainly, there is a fine tempting fitness about this; and I meant he was to hang. But
considering my minor characters, I saw there were five people who would in a sense, who must break prison and attempt his rescue. They were capable, hardy folks, too, who might should they not then? very well succeed.
now on
Why
should not young Hermiston escape clear out of the country? and be happy.
.
Why
UNITY OF TONE
Stevenson means this. keyed at the outset to the
to a story of this tone.
251
The
light
Little
Minister
is
romantic manner.
Character, incident, scene, and dialogue point

all
story logically precludes a
Yet the theme of the happy and romantic

choose
church.
ending.
The hero
is,
by
rights, forced to
between Babbie and
his
He
cannot
have both,
to
for they are irreconcilable.

is
To
sur-
render either
to involve tragedy.
Barrie elects
keep the tone romantic, in the vein of comedy, and forces his story to a conclusion which we cannot rightly believe.
We know it could not really
end that way, but we are glad that he chose to have it so, for our affections have been enlisted.
Nevertheless, though Barrie has been true to the
tone established, the story

for
is
badly constructed,
we should not be
forced to a position of sym-
pathy and judgment at odds.

true.
In The Ordeal of Richard Feverel the converse is There is here a discord between the tone
established at the outset

tion of the story.
and that
its
of the termina-
By
conditions the story
may
or may not end tragically, but the high romantic manner of the opening has led us to
expect a happy ending.

his head,
The author has
trusted
not his heart, in
forced his story to a logical

tistic
his choice and has though not an ar-
denouement.
His error lay in leading us
to anticipate something better.
With
his con-
252

mind
as he began, he should have
it.
elusion in
led us to expect
The
plays of Shakespeare afford numerous

scene of Hamlet
examples of tone in harmony with the theme.
From
the
first
and emotions
ments.
of the characters
the time, we are led
setting,
to
anticipate a tragedy involving supernatural ele-
From Romeo and Juliet we
expect at the
outset a romantic tragedy of rapid and exciting

action; from Twelfth Night a romantic
and sen-
timental comedy.
As You Like It
strikes a false
note at the outset and does not get into the appropriate tone for a scene or two; in fact, not
until the action
is
transferred to the forest.
In selecting incidents appropriate to the action a writer

is
guided almost solely by the nature
of the tone estabUshed.
In a dashing story of
adventure
hero
we gayly
accept the impossible.

in one of
The
may
perform prodigies and we never ques-
tion his ability.

n/
Yet
Jane Austen's
quiet stories
we
should be startled by any-
M. Marcel Schwob, in an illuminating passage, discusses this point with reference to Stevenson. The following
thing other than the commonplace.
is
a free translation of a part of his comment:
realism of Stevenson is quite irrational, that reason that it is so powerful. Stevenson regards objects only with the eyes of imagination. No man has a face as large as a
The
and
it is for
UNITY OF TONE
253
ham; the sparkling of the silver buttons of Alan Brack's coat when he leaps aboard the Covenant
highly improbable; the unwavering flames and of the candles in the duel scene of the Master of Ballantrae would be possible only in a laboratory; never would the leprosy resemble the speck of lichen which Keawe discovered on his skin; who can beUeve that CassiUs, in thePavilion on the Links, could see a man's eyes glisten in the light of the moon, though he was a good
is
smoke
many
error
yards distant? I need not speak of an which Stevenson himself recognized, that by which he made Alison do an impossible thing: and ''She spied the sword, picked it up
.
. .
thrust
it
But
to the hilt into the frozen ground." these are not in truth errors: they are
impressions stronger than reality itself. Often we find in writers the power of enhancing the effect of reality
through words alone; I know of no

. .
other impressions which without the aid of dicYet though tion are more vivid than reality. false to the world of experience as we know it, they are, properly speaking, the quintessence of They create that heightened vigor and fact. vivacity by which beings in the world of books surpass the people whom we know in the world
.
. . .
about
us.
The point would seem

is
to
be
this: in
romance
it
permissible to introduce impossible incidents
provided the story has wrought the reader to
such a pitch that he accepts the incidents as credThe converse is equally true. If a story ible.
254

it
has failed to create the necessary emotional condition in the reader
may
not introduce
inci-
dents perfectly possible but out of

the story.
harmony with
not credible.
We
will
not beheve such incident;

of the story it is
is
imder the conditions
Credibility, not possibility,
the test of incident,
and credibiUty depends upon the emotions and the imagination, not upon reasoned judgment.
Not every one beheves

reader.
tales,
this,
either writer or
scoff at
Readers there are
who
fairy
stories of the supernatural, anything, in
by the laws of natural science. mind argues a defective imagination. A good reader is himself an artist, and without him good writing would be impossible. Like the White Queen, your good reader can
short, not expHcable
Such a
state of
believe six impossible things before breakfast

only, before he can
do
so, it is essential
work him
to a pitch of imagination
that you and emotional
response to the story.
Mention was made in the chapter upon "Exposition and Preparation" of the surprise stories of 0. Henry. These are in part explicable by the
principles of construction there outlined, but as a
whole are more readily understood at
this point.
They may best be explained by

ganza.
analogy, and this
to a minor form of prose fiction, the extrava-
The extravaganza
is
openly in violation of
all
UNITY OF TONE
probability and possibility.
255
the reader
of
In
it
takes pleasure in the topsy-turvydom
the
natural order of events.

ical solution of
He
expects not a logillogical,
a difficulty but an
and he
Hke
finds pleasure in being outguessed
by
the author
alert,
is,
as to its terms.
He is,
however, on the
a scout anticipating an ambush, and who

fore,
there-
not surprised when he stumbles into one.
All depends
upon the awareness
of the reader.
falls
In Alice in Wonderland at the outset Alice

asleep.
We
then are prepared for the
illogical
order of dreams, and are not astounded when the White Rabbit begins to talk or when Alice falls to the bottom of the well unhurt. After this anything
may
happen, for the tone of extravaganza
has been
forth illogical
Events must, however, be henceand absurd, or the tone will be untrue, just as in a realistic story an extravagant circumstance would be false and out of tone. Fairy tales and stories of the supernatural partake ov
set.
the impossible in varying degrees.
In a story
which begins "Once there lived a witch," it is permissible that cats and dogs speak to us. The tone established permits such deviations from
human
its
experience.
life
Incident
is
selected not for

to the story.
truth to
but for
its suitability
The means whereby

ness
the heroine attains happi-
may
be impossible; yet a perfectly normal
incident involving her in unhappiness
when
the
256
story
had promised a brighter conclusion would this; it would be false art. 0. Henry in his stories masters the tone which permits the unexpected. Usually there is some logical preparation as well, but the main resource
be worse than
is
the established tone.
By
bizarre description,
setting,
and characterization the writer puts us on

Coincidence
the alert for unusual happenings.
and accident are here permissible, though these Thus in The in the normal story are taboo. the missing son is reFifth Wheel of the Chariot stored- to his mother by a chain of coincidences
which, in a story of a different tone,
accept.
we could not
of realism
reflect life.
All depends
upon the degree

it
with which the writer pretends to
The tone once established,

consistently.
light
must be maintained
Savage realism is as untrue to romance as incredible therefore as would be a normal reahstic cat in place of the Cheshire Cat in Alice in Wonderland. In the novels of Mr. Howells the light mood of romance or the bizarre incidents of O. Henry would strike as falsely upon the ear as a discord in music. Unity of tone, involving as it does the harmony of all parts, cannot be here illustrated in
each of
its
aspects.
My
illustration cited in the chapter
readers will recall the " "
upon
Dialogue
as a further case in point.
In the passage quoted,
Stevenson spoke of his
difficulty in pitching the
UNITY OF TONE
dialogue in The Ebb Tide to the proper key.
257
The
problem was
writer's
this: the narrative is told in the
own
person, the point of view being that
of the author-omniscient; the style, therefore,

is
that of Stevenson, the finished writer.
The
was a
characters, however, speak realistically, in an-
other tone, that
is.
Stevenson
felt
there
discord here, one which he could not overcome
by
the
reason of the point of view selected.
Were
story to be told from the point of view of one of
the participants the difficulty might be obviated,
but such a point

sought.
It
of
view would have made imposof
sible the character analysis which the author
was because
such
difficulties
that
Stevenson inclined to the point of view of the

actor-narrator, whose matter-of-fact narrative might be brought into accord with the dialogue. There are difficulties here as well, for a bare and restricted style proves uninteresting if long maintained,
sition
and the point of view hampers the expoand the choice of incident. The merit of the method is that it affords opportunity for a
consistent narrative tone.
A further problem of unity of

ter of appropriate setting.
tone
is
the mat-
Scene, time of year,

all
time of day, sunshine, rain, or fog are

the control of the writer.
within
He may
select such
natural conditions as will harmonize with his

story,
and influence the reader, through sugges-
258

mind
essential to
tion, to the state of
a proper
quiet,
acceptance of the story as a whole.

realistic stories of
The
Jane Austen and Howells de-
mand no unusual settings or conditions. Commonplace surroundings are in keeping with the incidents of the story; the wild and gloomy backgrounds of romantic noveHsts are unsuited to the
theme.
our own.
ells
So, too, are times
more romantic than Therefore, Jane Austen and Mr. How-
write of their
own
day.
The romantic auto the
thor goes afield in time and place to find circumstances in
harmony with his theme,
days of
knighthood, to the wars, to the wild places of the

earth or
;
if
he writes of our own day he seeks the

it
romantic aspects of
the
lives
of soldiers, detectives, criminals,
and conditions and the like.
The
writer
his story in the middle of
upon the supernatural does not set Broadway on a sunny

seeks mysterious houses, lonely
afternoon.
He
situations, night-time,
and other appropriate
cir-
cumstances.
For
his love scenes another selects
spring-time and outdoor beauty, sunshine and
growing things.
the hero
This
is
not the invariable prois
cedure, of course, for contrast
always possible;
may propose
to the heroine
on a
trolley-
car in a rain-storm.
Whatever
its
character, the
setting should be selected for its probable effect
upon the reader;

indifference.
it
can never be a matter
of
UNITY OF TONE
I fancy
259
many
readers objecting to this stateits
ment. They disdain the artistry which selects

scene, its time of
day and
year, its characters
and
This
dialogue and incident,

the object of effecting a
is
all
deliberately
and with
harmony
of parts.
too cold and deliberate a process, say they, and
its result is
conventionality and usualness.

artificial aids.
Let
of
us do without
The convention
is
a spring setting for a love scene

worn.
old
and time-
My story will gain in

However
freshness should I
discard the convention.

jection here, as in
In other words, the obart, is to
any sophisticated
ob-
vious
artifice.
deliberate
may have
been the selection of every detail, the effectiveness of the whole is impaired if too openly con-
The art of it should be concealed; story must be, seemingly, spontaneous. But
trived.
effect of careless frankness
tistic
the the
and disregard
of aritself.
conventions
is
a tone of writing in
The
actor-narrator perhaps remarks:
"I
am
plain, blunt
man, and
shall set
down
the strange
occurrences of the night of July 16 exactly as I
witnessed them."
to
This
is
a transparent attempt
command the reader's creduKty, and is as much
an artifice as any other tone. When artistically managed, however, the seemingly artless story is highly effective. Kipling and Conrad are successful often in concealing their artistry, and thus achieve convincingness. Conrad does it some-
26o
an inexperienced writer, by the hazardorder'.'^ Kipling, in his earlier stories, by a journaHstic method, by incorporating a good deal of corroborative detimes, like
ous expedient of violating the time
tail,
by suggestion
relating
the story to inci-
dents precedent, collateral, and subsequent, and
by an avoidance
story-teller
of the familiar devices of the

this effect of ease
contrives
and natis,
uralness.
We
believe that the author
as he
facts
pretends, a
mere eye-witness, chronicling
over which he has no control.

lished
is
tone so estabparticularly
excellent for
some purposes,
for stories of impossible or unlikely happenings.
The
businesslike matter-of-factness of the tone
inspires creduhty in the reader.
Many of Stock-
ton's stories achieve this effect admirably, utterly
absurd circumstances being told with a gravity of
countenance and a realism of detail which silence

scepticism.
In contrast with this easy, natural, and seemingly, artless tone are
many
of the stories of Ste-
venson and Poe.
These writers were, perhaps,
as consciously artistic as
any
is
in our hterature,
and at times their I have cited from
artistry
their
only too apparent.
works again and again,

advantage nearly
for they illustrate to the best
every point of story technic.
Yet
it is
undeniais
ble that the reader, though admiring the art,
not always carried away by the story. The con-
UNITY OF TONE
sciousness that the story
inant,
lutely
is
261
is
a thing apart
dom-
and the reader does not give himself absoto it; his imagination does not sweep him
In so far as this
is
to complete surrender.
true
the stories of Poe and Stevenson
thorne as well
conceals
and
Haw-
fall
short of the highest art which
itself.
The extreme of naturalness in tone may be illustrated by stories written after the manner of Nevinson's Slum Stories of London. In these the
structural principle that
no incident should be
development
in-
troduced which does not contribute to the progress of the story, to the
of plot, is
deliberately violated.
A situation is constructed
logical conclusion
which leads us to expect a

therefrom.
trived leads
its
Yet the preparation so carefully conto nothing. The story fails to realize
all
promise; characters introduced at the begin-
ning,
who
should by
the laws of conventional
structure reappear to round off the situation, are
never seen againness; that of
The
effect is of perfect casual-
life itself,
which prepares a situation

it.
and then neglects

experience of
to develop
stories.
Life
is filled
with such unfinished
had them and have been disappointed

All of us have
sight,
when
tion
the characters necessary for their comple-
have dropped from
never to reappear;
Life
death and circumstance intrude upon our expectation of
what
is fit
and appropriate.
is in-
262
yet to convey a sense of life's incompleteand inadequacy is in itself an artistic effect, if deliberately designed, and such stories as those of Nevinson arouse no thought of an inadequate
artistic;
ness
technic or a lack of
skill.
An
its
untrained writer
might through sheer

efifect
inability fail to
round
ofif
his
story in accordance with
terms.
But the
upon the reader would then be different. The unfinished ending, if it is to be effective, must
appear to be designed and not the result of mischance.
The French, who have mastered

life."
this
seemingly artless type of narrative,

the kind ''bits of
natural,
forth.
call stories of
is
Their tone
perfectly
and the
effect that of
reaHty vividly set

is,
high degree of selection
of course,
the basis of this effect, though the reason for that

selection
It
is
not obvious.
would seem, then, that an author may violate any of the structural conventions which we have so painstakingly set down, provided his
story purpose
to the right key.
liberate, for a
demand But
it
his violation
effect.
and he pitch his story must be deIf it is not,
preconceived
the story will appear ineffectual and inadequate;

his ignorance of his craft will
be certain at some
place to show.
I shall cite as
my
concluding illustration a
it
story of high artistry which, though
violates
certain of the conventional principles of structure,
UNITY OF TONE
succeeds admirably, as
ing unity of tone.
it
263
seems to me, in achievis
The
story
Stevenson's Will
o'Jhe Mill.
^
The
action covers the entire Hfetime of a
man,
a theme which we previously declared to be unfitted for a short story.' Space is necessary to develop character, and this a short story has not.
But though Will o"

life,
the
Mill
is
the story of a man's
"~7
'
no attempt made to develop a complex character. The story is concerned with but one of Will's problems, which is this Is happiness
there
is
:
to be
won by
is
life of
action or of contemplation?
Will
a contemplative character.
He
never
goes far
from the mountain valley in which he was born, though from it he looks upon the seaward plain and the cities of men, with all the acEchoes of Hf e occativities which these suggest. An army once sionally disturb the quiet valley.
passes through and vanishes, never to return.
Travellers put
up
for a time
and go
their
way.
Of the hfe beyond the valley Will knows only by hearsay, and he ponders a bit wistfully what he
Of human life near at home he knows He is once in love but little through experience. so placidly that marriage seems to him undesirlearns.
able,
and the girl, though she loves him, marries somebody else. After this he still remains in his valley home and evolves his philosophy of Hfe:
lies
that the strangeness of Hfe
within himself,
264

is
that adventure
of the spirit,
and not to be
recur-
found among the things of the earth.

It
is
the emphasis
upon and constant
rence of this idea which chiefly unifies the story,
though the freedom from

sharp transitions in time
iied
effect.
specific incident
situation, the unity of place,

all
and and the lack of
contribute to a uni-
The
narrative
and dialogue are
pitched to the same key of simplicity.

scription of the sea, for a sight of
longs,
is
de-
which Will
but
given, not in the
words
is
of the author,
in the simple
and
artless
language of the Miller.

the key-note, and the
So, throughout, simpHcity
tone
is
uniform.
The
effect is powerful, partly

signifi-
because of this and partly because of the

cance of the theme, which
the query:
is
close to every
one
shall
What is
is,
the end of Kfe, and
how
man
best conduct himself therein?

of tone
Unity
to repeat, the chief of all uniis
ties, for its
purpose
to
make upon
It
the reader a
single emotional effect.
demands that the
emotion of the writer dominate and suffuse his theme, that it be in accord with that theme. It
demands that the

energies to
it.
writer clearly
know his purpose

all his
before he begins to write, and that he bend
What
the tone
may be is
as vari-
ous as are the emotions.
CHAPTER XIV
THE PSYCHOLOGY OF STORY WRITING

So
far as I
am
aware,
little
has been written to
reveal the actual mental processes incident to
story composition.
tion working in
Brain, emotion, and imagina-
harmony upon a theme achieve a result, and, behold a story. But this is all too indefinite. What we desire is to follow the actual
!
mental
steps, to trace the false starts, to analyze
the reasons which led to the acceptance of one

idea or the rejection of another; to decide,
sible,
if
pos-
upon some economical procedure by
follow-
ing which
we can
ourselves, without waste of
energy, contrive an effective story.
Authors have unfortunately

guidance.
left little for
our
Perhaps they fear to show us the gross process of story development lest we be appalled at the crudity of it and no longer think of the author as a person somehow different from the
rest of us, of finer
in
mind and imagination, working some mysterious and inspired way. Or, again,
are
many
doubtless
forgetful
of
their
is
own
chains of thought, and, once the story

265
created,
266

its
are unable to retrace the steps of
development.
Certain
it is
that one has to build his theory of
the story writer's psychology from hints gathered
here and there, and from such rare and illuminating documents as Poe's Philosophy of Cofnposition.
The imagination under

of the intelligence, which,
the dominance of an
emotion contrives a story through the exercise

if
trained
by
critical
it
study,
is
is
equipped for the demands to which

It must, however,
subjected.
have a theme
upon which
vacuo.
It
is
to work, for it cannat function in
here that the young writer meets his
initial difficulty.
He
is
wishes to express his noconfident that he has
tions of Ufe,
and he
much
had a theme, but he is aghast when for the first time he realizes that he has no particular story to tell. His first need is some means whereby he may secure a story theme. Ideas for stories, it is true, come often through the workings of the subconscious mind. Of a sudden and without warning an idea pops to the surface Hke a cork freed from restraint, and the writer congratulates himself upon a lucky inspiration. Yet this is a chance discovery; often he is not so fortunate, and meanwhile he must work.
to say, provided he
How
shall
can he force himself to acquire themes?

elaborate here
somewhat the
discussion I
upon story ideas
to be found in
Chapter X.
PSYCHOLOGY
assume, of course, that
267
as
my mind works much

I find useful
any one
else's
and that what

It
is
may be
is
of value to others.
possible that this
not,
in every instance, so,
but I have no other recourse

this assumption.
and must proceed upon

Story ideas
character, place, idea,
may spring, we said, from incident,
and emotion. The theme any of these may arise spontaneously in the mind as the result of associations which we cannot analyze. If it does not, we must resort to various expedients. For the moment I shall confine myself to the story of incident and enumerate several devices whereby a plot may be secured. I may first go to other stories or plays and borrow a plot. This method has the sanction of
for
Shakespeare,
tories,
who sought
his plots in novels, his-
and other
plays, often combining several
from diverse sources, modifying as he deemed best, and in the end creating a new thing. His
originality lay not so
much
in devising incidents
and contriving action

into
as in imagining appropri-
ate characters; did his plays not reveal an insight
human
nature surpassing that of his con-
more beautiful and varied than theirs, he would not be regarded as their superior upon the sole point of plot contemporaries,
and a
style
struction.
I
may, then, take such a story
as Cinderella, or as
Patient Griselda, or a
poem such
The Ancient
268
Mariner, or Andrea del Sarto, or a story from

it. This means that new characters, situations, and settings I invent which will make the old theme new and different. Or, again, I may pick up the latest magazine and
Boccaccio, and modernize
with a story theme taken therefrom devise a variant which, when I have done, will bear no resemblance to the original.
Again, I may utilize some
chance incident which I have heard related, or I
may
cern
turn to the newspaper for an idea.

is
My con-
with the starting-point.
departure,
my
Given a point of imagination under guidance can
spin the story.
Let me take a specific instance. I once read a newspaper item to the effect that a maiden lady, deceased, had left all her property to be devoted
to the care of her pet cat.
This
is
a somewhat
unusual procedure, and visions of disappointed
and
irate relatives
hovered in the background as

left to
I read.
these,
Suppose the cat
the care of one of

its
he to spend the income upon
mainteIt
life
nance, subject, of course, to legal supervision.

is
to his apparent advantage to prolong the
of the cat.
Suppose him tempted to substitute

is
a second cat surreptitiously upon the death of the

first.
Here
a nice point of ethics, involving
some
sibilities
But further possuggest themselves. The disposition of the property, once the cat is dead, is known only
interesting psychology.
PSYCHOLOGY
to the lawyer.
269
The
relative naturally supposes
that
it will
not come to him.

in the
He substitutes
the
second
dares,
is his,
cat,
maintains the fraud as long as he
and
end discovers that the property
that had he been honest he would have
been the gainer.

let
Or a second ending
is
possible
him
it
resist
temptation and be rewarded for
his honesty.
From
of
a small but definite begindifficult to devise
ning
has not been
a plot as
in the
good as that
magazines.
many
a story
we read
is,
A likely
ities
storehouse for story themes

All
have
always thought, legal records.
human
activ-
come
at last to court.
are suggested there,
All manner of stories and were I in need of a
theme
bear
it
I should seek one of the
many
published
records of cases.
little
The theme
I selected
might
relation to the subsequent story, but
my
would be a definite starting-point, and that is immediate concern. Collections of fables, folklore, poetry, biography, and the like might
serve
my purpose
equally well.
Character themes I discussed somewhat at

length in a previous chapter.
is
The
I
source again
observation or literature.
may borrow
character as did Turgenieff or select some person

I
know, simplifying to secure consistency and
brevity.
My situations
I shall devise to set the
character forth adequately.
270

Do
is
Scene, too, I have discussed elsewhere.
not imagine that foreign or unusual experience

necessary to a story of this type.
of life
What manner What
may
be appropriate to the Httle house on
the corner, to the apartment opposite?

story will convey
my sense of desolation as I conmean outskirts of a great

a type of
life
template the ragged and

city?
What
will express
suited
to the tawdry or respectable
mansion on the
avenue?
tion, and,
little
Each
of these is food for the imagina-
though the resulting story bear but resemblance to the initial suggestion, this
its
has served
purpose, none the
less, in
stimu-
lating invention.
Stories of idea were considered at sufficient
length in another place.
Their source
is,
again,
a generalization based upon experience, or an inspiration derived from reading. I should be

careful to select one
which
is
of genuine interest
to me, for otherwise I court failure.

original in this field I should
To be
truly
be something of a
philosopher, for
if
do not genuinely hold the
idea which I seek to express, the resulting story
be cold and reveal too openly the source from which I derived it. None the less the startingwill
point
fire
may be the thought of another, provided it me with speculations of my own.

have chosen to base
I
this
my
plot illustration for
chapter upon a story idea which springs
PSYCHOLOGY
reader a specific emotion.
I
271
simply from the determination to arouse in the
have done
is
this for
the reason that the impulse here

est,
of the slight-
the choice a mere exercise of the judgment.

in the first stages, therefore, is
The development
almost purely intellectual and should show to some degree how the imagination may be guided
into channels wherein
it will
work with the maxi-
mum
of
economy and
is
is,
effect.
The
difficulty in
story writing
not to imagine but to imagine

to imagine in such a
effectively, that
way
as
To do to accomplish a predetermined purpose. imagination must be held in check until this the
the story theme has been outlined with some
completeness.
I select
my
theme,
fear,
because this
is
powerful passion, one universal and compelling.
What
are the ideas associated with fear?
The
following present themselves:
Death, danger, the unknown, the supernatural, fear for another, ridicule.
I think also of associated devices: night, lonely

situation, criminal or savage
men, war, ghosts,

associated
I
and the
ideas,
like.
Doubtless there are
many more
the
but invention
fails for
moment, and
it.
review the Hst to see what I can make of recognize here the conventional elements of
stories,
many
Still
some
of
which
I recall specifically.
272
I

Doubtless a new and effective
am dissatisfied.
story can be built of the old materials, but I desire
something fresher, something which I can
seize
upon with
interest.
Is there
pelling fear than
any
of these?
no more comThe thought is

is
illuminating.
of himself.
Surely the great fear
a man's fear
I feared
remember moments when
greatly that I should

I should say or
make a
fool of myself, that
do something I didn't intend. I too, that my will might become powerless and I mad. Here are various themes more vital and less hackneyed than those first suggested.
have feared,
How then shall I make use of self-fear as a story

motive?
Shall I simply analyze the emotion,
setting it forth in trivial incident?
Great writers
plot.
have done
I possess.
this,
but
it calls
for greater
I need to devise action
power than What,
then, if some one inspire this fear some purpose revenge, perhaps?
in another for
This appeals
playing upon
to me.
I shall conceive of a
man
the emotions of another to revenge himself for
some wrong.
rivalry for a
The victim may have succeeded in woman; his enemy may be, ostenintimacy
is
sibly, his friend, as
essential
if
the
victim
is
to be played upon.
is
The means
that he
is
to be subtle suggestion, the vic-
tim a trusting and honorable person unaware

being influenced.
I It remains then to
first of
devise situations.
thought
the follow-
PSYCHOLOGY
ing: the victim
is
273
to be a doctor attendant
upon
a relative
death.
who is hopelessly ill and who desires The doctor may profit by a bequest
relative dies.
when the
Suggestion tempts the
doctor to give his patient the means of suicide.
He
fights the thought,
and the
fear of himself be-
comes a nightmare.
I did not like this plot, for it appealed to
me
as conventional.
this
Surely I had read stories with
I must seek a better. Here is a poshad ignored. What of the woman for whom the men had been rivals? The loser would wish above all things to lower the husband in the eyes of the wife. To make him act dishonorably, to reveal in him forces which the wife had never suspected, would be a fitting revenge. The theme has now changed somewhat, but no matter, for we have a story in sight. A difiiculty arises,
theme.
sibility I
however, at this point.
band
do not wish the husman. What, then, am I to do? I fall back upon psychology. All of us, I reflect, have base thoughts which we suppress, are subject to temptations which we resist, but of which we are none the less ashamed.
I to be a really dishonorable
We
are debased in our
own
eyes that
we should
harbor them, rather than glad of our power to
overcome them. Let us suppose that the husband does not grasp this fact and that under the
influence of suggestion he fancies his nature de-
274

He
is
show himself in and thus lose Here is the situthe love and respect of his wife. ation, the temptation another woman, perhaps. The denouement must be the husband's confescaying.
afraid he will
what he
fancies are his true colors
sions of his terror of
self.
I then conceive his
wife to be a woman of understanding who has long

distrusted her husband's supposed friend
and
is
able to put two
and two together.
She opens his

This
eyes to the friend's poisonous suggestions.
development has forced

will become for
me to
outline
my charac-
ters with some definiteness.
I feel that in time they
me distinct and individual persons. We have now to devise scenes and to select a
life,
point of view, setting, class of
and
to deter-
mine the
the
first
tone.
At
the outset I
am
troubled
story I planned, that of the doctor.
by The
very conception of the story suggested the shadow

of a scene.
his hopeless patient
the
means
of
saw dimly the doctor looking upon and tempted to permit him suicide. That scene, slight as it is,
suffices to distract
me
as I seek to imagine other
situations appropriate to
my
altered story.
must beware
of
hampering myself
I
in like fashion
a second time.
must decide
first
upon
desira-
ble situations before I let
my
imagination
make
them
real to
me,
for it
is
very hard to erase any-
thing which has once been definitely conceived.
Let me
first
determine the point of view.
Upon
PSYCHOLOGY
unsuited to
that
tell
275
a hasty consideration I dismiss the characters as

the story, for
my theme demands
the thoughts of
my
reader become acquainted with hidden
motives.
all
Some one who knows

Yet
I
the characters seems best, the omniscient au-
thor, therefore.
do not wish
to
tell
every-
thing.
Suggestion will be a powerful aid in makas one with qualified omniscience,

inti-
ing the situations and characterization telling.

I
must write
understanding but one of the characters

mately.
to moralize a bit, but don't wish to
Again, on second thought, I might wish
do so
in
my
own person.
I revert to the first possibility, that
of the actor-narrator.
How
can any such be ac-
quainted with
all
the facts the reader should

tell how he came to Can we imagine some one in-
know?
Suppose he doesn't
so
know
was
much?
venting the story,

in
or, better,
intimating that he
it?
some undefined way connected with

all
Perhaps he knew
the participants, one of
whom
the
confessed to him.
Or suppose him one
of
men involved, the instigator of the situation, a man of keen insight though conscienceless. He may seek relief from his sense of guilt by anonymous confession. This is true to human nature,
and,
if
the truth
is
but hinted
at,
envelops the
story in suggestion.
Who,
viously,
then, shall be the centre of action?

if
Ob-
the narrator
is,
as suggested, a par-
276

own
we
shall see the story-
tidpant, he will unconsciously dwell on his
thoughts and observations;
through his eyes. Therefore he must be the cenThere are difficulties here, for he tre of action.
must be keen
to read in others
know
for
an
intelligent grasp of the story.
what we must But
difficulties of
some
sort are inherent in all points
of view.
The tone must be
serious.
We have departed
we
seek no
so far from our initial impulse that
longer to arouse a crude emotion of fear.
Rather
we wish
conduct.
to stir the reader to thoughtful intro-
spection, to
make him
speculate on problems of
Our tone
will
be one of moral gravity
seeking to arouse a thoughtful self-analysis.
What is
We
the state of the problem to this point? have a story told by a participant of the
action, this suggested only.
He seeks
to revenge
himself
a fear of
his
upon his successful rival by stirring him to The victim ultimately confesses to self. wife, who forgives him, and the enemy is cast
This
is
into outer darkness.

of the result of
a concise statement
much
analysis,
but by reason
of
by which we arrived at it, more significant than had it been given us out of hand by some one else. We have conceived characters with some definiteness and have found much to write about on the way.
the thought processes
it is far
We
have the materials
for
a story.
PSYCHOLOGY
First of all
277
we have
is
the initial scene.
A num-
ber of
ences.
men
are gathered together relating experidiscussed,
Fear
and the opening for the

necessary exposition
narrative provided.
The
can be set forth in the words of the speaker. The class of life has been decided by the nature
of the story.
class, for
It
must be the middle

of the story
or upper
the character of the action
is intellec-
tual.
The persons
reflect.
must not be too
primitive, such as speak their thoughts at once,
but such as
sion.
I foresee a difficulty in the husband's confes-
How
can the wife be brought to a right

Obviously her sus-
understanding of the truth?

picions of the friend
must be aroused, and she
must be observant of many things before the confession. The other woman may be a guest in the house, a relative, perhaps, and the action take
place there.
This has the advantage of unity.

quiet and domestic, a dinner,
The
scenes
may be
a conversation or two, several interviews of the
man
with his friend
essential to the necessary

we need
in the
suggestion.
incident.
That
is all
way
of
The
effectiveness of the story will dechiefly.
pend upon the elaboration, upon dialogue
As I review this analysis I am remoteness of the conclusion from the inception of the theme, and with my own moralizing tendency.
struck with the
The bent
of
my
mind has revealed
itself
278

made
of
at every turn, and I have

is
my
materials
Another mind beginwhat ning at the same point would have arrived at a story utterly different. But though I have not
of interest to
me.
done as I intended at the outset, I have arrived

with a
story,
fair
degree of definiteness at a possible

if
one which,
I
well
enough elaborated
is
will
be worth the doing.
This demonstrates that the

of
method
have employed
is,
some
value.
The
It
story
of course, far
for purposes of illustration I
from done, though drop it at this point.
must be
laid aside for

is
grow.
Story growth
a while and allowed to an interesting thing,

It
is
though not to be definitely analyzed.
mostly a subconscious process and requires time. Every little while I shall turn to my story and
attempt to visualize the characters or to elaboIt is as though the story rate a bit of dialogue.
were a seed sprouting in darkness, at which I look I can observe its occasionally to note progress.
growth but I cannot explain it. Of this I am sure in time it will cease to be a story, an invented I shall have been thing, and will become real. familiar with it for so long that I shall be unable to distinguish
this stage of
it
from
fact.
development
it
When it reaches may begin to write By
upon
it.
To
clothe
in
words
is
a forcing process.
putting pen to paper I stimulate thought and
PSYCHOLOGY
discover
279
what my mind has been doing with the theme while I have left it. The pen point serves to precipitate and crystallize ideas unrecognized until the moment of writing. Each draught of my story will be a little more elaborate and definite
than the
write
it
last.
Finally, I shall be prepared to

all
afresh in its ultimate form, ignoring

lie
previous attempts, for the story will
in
my
mind
and complete. I need not, of pen to paper to bring it to this final I may have carried it in my memory state. throughout. All depends upon my individual idiosyncrasies, the manner in which I work
definite
course, set
best.
Rarely
will
a story written in the
first
creative
definite
impulse carry conviction.
Even though
and well constructed, it will be, somehow, thin. It will lack the power of suggestion, that is, of relation to the life about it, which we saw to be desirable.
This power of suggestion
will
be lacking
because the story is, in truth, without it, the characters not conceived with the necessary fulness,
nor the story as but a single incident related to the larger whole of life. The dearth of mate-
be apparent. If enough time is given for a proper growth, this defect will be remedied. Unconsciously the author will endow the story with a background and make the incidents he tells significant of more which he suppresses.
rial will
28o

make
this discussion as
I have endeavored to
specific as possible
rated
my
and have, therefore, elaboillustration at what would, otherwise,

length.
I
be undue
stories are
cannot pretend that
all
outlined, but
the
less,
composed after the manner I have what has been set down may, none afford some assistance to my readers in
It seems to
the solution of their difficulties.
me
possible to develop a method of story-construction
which
shall
be to some degree free from the

is
hit-or-miss practice of letting the imagination
roam at
it
will.
The imagination
the most vital
of the faculties involved, but without guidance
may
lead us nowhere or plunge us into
diffi-
culties
which the
critical intelligence will find
almost insuperable.
is
The
It
story
mould once
cast
not easily broken.

it
is,
therefore, well to con-
struct
on sound
lines.
At
this point of
our discussion
it is
scarcely
necessary to indicate the value of study and the
mastery of
critical principles.
it is, will
Native endowsuffice of itself.
ment, necessary as
not
The imagination must be

the resources of story
disciplined
at the direction of a guiding intelligence.
and work Once
that the writer works freely with

scious of power.
method are so mastered them he is conThere will be a time when they
seem
to
scious
hamper him, for he will be unduly conof them, and subservient to their require-
PSYCHOLOGY
ments.
281
But he can gain freedom only through he ignores them as academic and deadhis mind will never receive the discipline ening, essential to good work. Nor, when he is unsucthem.
If
cessful, will
he know the cause of

is
failure.
The
true artist
always keenly interested in the

all its
mechanics of his trade, in

It
is
technicahties.
the sentimentalist and he
who
shirks
work
who ignores the example and the advice of others. A writer who relies upon inspiration will seldom
accomplish much.
and short-story writers hints are to be found here and there in letters and biographies. To Poe's method in The
Of the methods
of novelists
Raven I have already made reference. Hawthorne, it is apparent from his note-book, worked
often from an abstract conception to the story which embodied it. A passage from George
Eliot's letters reveals a like
method
of work.
Writing to Frederic Harrison, she says:
That
have
culties,
is
a tremendously
difficult
problem you
see its
diffi-
laid before
me; and
I think
you
though they can hardly press upon you as they do on me, who have gone through again and again the severe efforts of trying to make
certain ideas thoroughly incarnate, as if they revealed themselves to me first in the flesh and not
in the spirit.
I think aesthetic teaching is the highest of all teaching, because it deals with Y\if* But if it ceases to be in its highest complexity.
282
purely aesthetic if it lapses anywhere from the picture to the diagram it becomes the most Consider the sort offensive of all teaching. of agonizing labor to an EngKsh-fed imagination to make out a sufficiently real background for the to get breathing individual desired picture, forms, and group them in the needful relations, so that the presentation will lay hold on the emo-
tions as
**
human
experience,
flash'* conviction
will, as you say, on the world by means of
aroused sympathy.
A like progress from the abstract conception to

the concrete story
is
to
of Stevenson's stories, Dr. Jekyll
be noted in at least one and Mr. Hyde.
theme which he endeavored to clothe in story form was that of the dual personality of man, the good and evil spirits which struggle for mastery. Thus stated the theme is abstract; but so well realized is the story that its moral is for most readers an afterthought. The plot, the incidents, are in
are told in his biography that the
We
themselves compelling.
Turgenieflf's
other place.
ing-point.
method I have referred to in anWith him character was the startPerhaps the "born story-tellers " purFor them,
Incidents and
sue a less self-conscious method.
morals and ideas are secondary.
emotions are their game, and doubtless they experience less difficulty in realizing their conceptions than
do writers who make use
of the story
PSYCHOLOGY
form
It
for a philosophical purpose.
283
One can but

all
guess at their methods of work.

is
self-evident, I take
it,
that with
our
talk of story
of
methods and economical processes work we have shed little hght upon the heart
Eliot.
of the mystery, that hinted at in the passage
quoted from George

story
We may
outHne a
tests.
by an
exercise of the intelligence

will
and devise
a structure which
this outline is
meet our critical

its
But
the
not a story until
abstractions
become flesh-and-blood most difficult step of all.
reahties.
This
is
A great writer such as We
George Eliot confesses her weakness here, and

for the best of story-tellers this part of the crea-
tive process
must be
difficult.
cannot an-
alyze the mysterious transformation which the
imagination in some
character real as
convincingly.
way
is
effects,
that whereby a
to talk
and act Our method can take us to this

life
made
point and no further.
CHAPTER XV
CONCLUSION
At ['
cise
the outset of our study
we
declared a con-
yet adequate definition of the short story to
be impossible.
We chose instead to consider the

all
underlying principles of
narrative writing,
j
;
pointing out that the shorter the story the more exacting became the selective process and the
more
unified the action, place,
and time^J^Loose-
ness of construction, often permissible in a long

is, in the short story, accompanied by no compensating advantages. The writer must bend all his artistic ingenuity to the accomplishment of swift and emphatic effects. /Should we
narrative,
seek a loose characterization of the short story as

distinguished from a long
we should
find our
terms chiefly in the chapter devoted to unitv^ of

writer,
short story aims at a single effect: the dominated by a single emotion, endeavors so to devise his story as to convey this and arouse an echo of it in his readers. In a longer
tone/i
narrative the writer
is less
rigidly
bound, and in
the endeavor to arouse a variety of effects

284
may
CONCLUSION
285
more nearly mirror the complexities of emotional life. Definitions more precise than this will not
profit us.
I trust that
from our discussion of principles no
reader has devised for his guidance any inflexible
body of rules. One does not achieve a good story by a mere adherence to precept. Yet a knowledge of possible effects and the means whereby good writers have attained these is not only desirable but essential. The power of self-criticism is necessary to all good work. Moreover, it is by imitation first that a writer attains a mastery of his craft; later he may come to the point
at which true individual expression
is
possible.
The most
work
alyze,
original of geniuses
of his predecessors.
must profit by the He must study, an-
and imitate before
he, in his turn,
may
is
achieve originahty.
final stage,
Most
so,
of us never reach the
but even
the study of technic
not only interesting in

it
itself
but valuable in that

of reading.
develops a power of discriminating apprecia-
tion
and thus enhances the joys
I fancy there will be
many who
disagree with
There is a wide-spread behef in this assertion. "inspiration" which I, personally, do not share. Writing is an intellectual exercise which may be
mastered to the degree of the native intelligence
of the student just as
other study.
may law, medicine, or any Any one who seeks to improve
286

it,
himself in
own defects,
of this idea.
and who will frankly recognize his may do much to develop his powers.
I wish to devote a Httle space to the elaboration
Granted an adequate technic

of expression which, as sult of study, practice,
that
seen,
is,
means
the re-
we have
is
and self-criticism Kterary power is dependent upon freshness of impression and truth of insight. Observation and thought^ are the two essentials. All of us see and think to some degree, but no one to the utmost of his
innate capacity.
We permit conventional inter-
pretations of Hfe both to dull our ability to see

afresh
tion.
and
to phrase the results of our observaof us, in Stevenson's phrase, "swallike a pill."
Most
low the universe

our
A
is
recognition of
first
is,
own
conventional natures
the
step to
I take
freedom and power.

it,
The
true writer
forever in a state of wonder, conscious always
of the infinite variety

life affords.
and entertainment which

of
The power
a
wonder, or freshness
youth; in
all
of impression, is largely
gift of
it
but
strongly individual natures
dies soon.
We be-
come with the years at home with life and find this a more comfortable state than the more vivid emotions of youth. But it is not a writer*s
business to be comfortable but to see.
he would see freshly he must force himself so to do.

If
is
This
a matter of
will.
CONCLUSION
The
recognition of the plasticity of one's
is
287
own
nature, of the dominance of the will,
essential
not only to moral but to

not, to be sure,
artistic
growth.
may
make
it.
of myself
whatsoever I
desire, ap-
choose, but I
may
approximate
my
proach ever nearer to
With
is
this I
must, per-
force, be content, for I
am
not to blame that
my
capacity for self-improvement
not the greatest.
My concern
I
is
the development, to their utmost,
of those possibilities I possess.
may by
nature be unobservant.
If I recog-
nize the defect I
the world
may force myself to see more in about me than I have hitherto noted.
to the degree of another's natural enI
The power will grow with use, and, though I never

develop
it
Kim, in and to remember. This is a fictitious instance, to be sure, but I fancy that Kipling drew upon his own experience in its creation. A more authentic illustration is that of the training which Maupassant underwent at the hands of Flaubert. No small part of this was devoted to mere visual observation, for upon perception and memory much literary power depends. Hawthorne made use of
dowment,
have yet done something.
Kipling's story,
was trained
to observe
note-books to record his impressions.

spread similar practices
How wide-
among
other authors
may
cise is self-evident.
be I cannot say, but the merit of the exerIf I am slow to distinguish
288

can remedy the defect
It is not
the characteristics of sounds or to note the play

of facial expression, I
somewhat by
matter which
portunity.
deliberate attention.
calls for leisure or
a
I
exceptional op-
The
materials are to
my
hand
if
will avail myself of them.

is true of thought. Most of us are by the routine of daily hfe, so dependent upon books and newspapers for our
The same
so involved
ideas, that the habit of
thought
its
is
undeveloped
and the opportunity for

Effort
is
exercise seems scant.
required
if
we
are to react
upon our
If
ex-
perience and form individual opinions.
we are
in
modest, courage
is
necessary
if
we
are to find
worth in opinions so formed.

all
Yet a man may,
humility, recognize his ideas to be inadequate
and yet
If he is to find some good in them. must have some conceit of himself, for otherwise the great names of literature will op>press him to utter silence. Herein Hes the dan-
write he
ger of an academic training.
The
well-read
man
thinks that everything worth the saying has been

said.
But
are ideas essential to literary power?
Are
not emotional susceptibility and imagination the

chief essentials?
In poetry, certainly, originality
of thought
seems to be secondary.
is
The poet
is
phrases ideas current in his time; what
de-
manded
of
him
power
of expression.
In
fiction
CONCLUSION
this is
289
not true to so great an extent.

writer,
In
its
best
examples
fiction is increasingly intellectualized.
The conventional
worn
ideas, is less
he who accepts out-
a power in his generdo not mean to say that every noveUst need write with a purpose, but he should at least be abreast of his day and, in so far as he can, react upon its thought with ideas of his own. For ideas determine a man's attitude toward life, and The this it is which gives his work originality.
less
and
ation.
fiction
writer
should read
thought-provoking
books; the ideas of others will stimulate his.

History, biography, criticism, philosophy, and
all
documents which report

ports of observers in
missionaries,
life
at
first
hand; the
re-
all fields of life
and
social
workers
these
travellers,
should
constitute his reading.
The
skilful fiction writer
not only observes

library.
afield
is
but also studies in his
more than a record of imIt is a comment upon life. pressions. Observation and thought are much, but symHis work
pathetic insight into the lives of others
is
yet
more.
This
is
nothing but imagination.
The
unsympathetic
place,
man is the one of untrained imagnot
ination; he does not see himself in his neighbor's
and so
is
of those
about him.
moved by the joy and sorrow The novelist must be able

and that
the lives of
to enter into the lives of his characters,
such
may be real he must understand
290

life is
those about him, for a knowledge of

to,
a guide
and a check upon, the imagination.
Without
this check,
imagination degenerates into fancy.
Imagination, leading to insight and sympathy,
may be developed somewhat by exercise.

uable practice
is
A val-
the deliberate creation of inci-
dents and circumstances in the lives of others
whom we know
is
but slightly. The imagination and working from a slight basis of observation may create a structure logical and true. JMr. Henry James relates the instance of a
constructive,
novelist
who wrote
convincingly of the hfe of

sole basis in observation
French Protestants, the
being but a glimpse into a
home
of this class
novelist, a woman that she was much commended for the impression she had managed to give in one of her tales of the nature and way of She had life of the French Protestant youth. been asked where she learned so much about this recondite being, she had been congratulated on her pecuUar opportunities. These opportunities consisted in her having once, in Paris, as she ascended a staircase, passed an open door where, in the household of a pasteur, some of the young
...
remember an English
of genius, telling
me
Protestants were seated at table round a finished meal. The glimpse made a picture; it lasted only a moment, but that moment was exShe had got her direct personal imperience. She knew pression, and she turned out her type. what youth was, and what Protestantism; she
CONCLUSION
also
291
it
had the advantage
of
having seen what
was
ity.
to be French, so that she converted these ideas into a concrete image and produced a real-
Above
all,
however, she was blessed with
the faculty which
when you
give
it
an inch takes
greater source of strength than any accident of residence or of place in the social scale. The power to guess the unseen from the seen, to trace the implication of things, to judge the whole piece by the pattern, the condition of feeling life in general so completely that you are well on your way to knowing any particular corner of it this cluster of gifts may almost be said to constitute experience, and they occur in country and in town, and in the most differing stages of education. If experience consists of impressions, it may be said that impressions are experience, just as (have we not seen it?) they are the very air we breathe. Therefore, if I should certainly say to a novice, "Write from experience and experience only," I should feel that this was rather a tantalising monition if I were not careful immediately to add, ''Try to be one of the people on whom nothing is
ell,
an
and which
for the artist is a
much
lost."J
Details are significant of a greater whole, and
from a remark, a glimpse into a home or shop, or an exchange of glances, I may create an imaginative structure which is true to probability, true,
that
cific
is,
to the nature of
life if
not true to the spe-
instance.
Thus
the ethnologist
may from
skull determine the
whole nature, physical and
292

from a single bone reconstruct an antediThe imagination in such an exguided in part by experience and in part
mental, of a prehistoric man; or the paleontologist
luvian monster.
ercise is
by the logical sense. pend much upon it.

no greater a handicap
wealth of powers.
natural voice
his resources.
is
The
story writer
must de-
Limitation of natural endowment

to successful
is
sometimes
work than a
The
singer with the glorious,
under no necessity of enlarging Sheer beauty of tone will carry
him over his
difficulties.
The
less-gifted singer is
obliged to supplement his voice

beautiful enunciation,
sicianship,
color.
by cultivating a by developing his muthe
by
enlarging his resources of tone-
In the end he
may be
more
successful
two by reason of his shrewd utilization of all his powers and by his careful avoidance of monotony. My readers must have noted the many instances in which I have cited Stevenson to illusof the
trate this or that point in construction.
Steven-
son
is
is
not the greatest of modern writers; his work
life
little thin, a bit self-conscious, and touches none too intimately. But, as he said truly of himself, few writers with so limited a natural en-
dowment have gone

inspiring example.
so far.
He
is,
therefore,
an
The
pleasure
we
derive from
art lies in the sense of its triimiph over difficulties
CONCLUSION
293
of
în
sculptor's
form and materials, as in the sonnet or the marble but often, in the very nature
the artist.
The
story that Turner's color

is
sense sprang from defective vision

point.
a case in
Only
phasized
and the point cannot be overemimperative that a writer early defield
it is
termine his limitations, and work in that
or
medium
for
which his powers may suffice.
To do
this requires
self-knowledge and the study of
artistic resources; that is to say, technic.
APPENDIX
I
HAVE included
Poe's Philosophy of Composifirst,
tion within the covers of this book,
because
my
treatment of story writing owes

of his
its
inspiration in
part to this essay; secondly, because Poe's analysis

definite and method to be found in English literature. Though it has mainly to do with The Raven, a poem, the method outlined
manner
of
work
is
one of the few
helpful discussions of constructive
is
equally applicable to stories.
Considerable doubt has been cast upon the honesty

of Poe's confession.
It is felt
ative process as defined

tellectual to
by many that the creby Poe is altogether too infacts.
be in accord with the
The poet
and the story writer surely do not work in so mathematical a mood, their processes of thought are not so
coldly critical; emotional rather than intellectual judgments must, we think, largely determine the
formal devices of expression.
In answer to this criticism

of Poe's statement, his
we
have, as verification
stories.
poems and
These
judgment a confirmation rather than a His poetry lacks that of his method. refutation final charm which eludes analysis; it is a little cold
are in
my
and
calculated.
So, too, with his stories.

29s
They
are
296
APPENDIX
is
the work of an excellent craftsman, but our admiration for the technic
seldom
lost in
itself.
a complete
emotional surrender to the story

so
That
this is
marks a
defect, certainly, in Poe's art;
but our ap-
preciation of the fact should not blind us to his great
and obvious
merits.
THE PHILOSOPHY OF COMPOSITION

Charles Dickens, in a note now lying before me, alluding to an examination I once made of the mech-
anism of "Barnaby Rudge," says "By the Vv-a}', are you aware that Godwin wrote his 'Caleb Williams' backwards? He first involved his hero in a web of difficulties, forming the second volume, and then, for the first, cast about him for some mode of accounting for what had been done."
I cannot think this the precise
on the part
of
Godwin
and indeed what he himself
mode
of procedure
acknowledges, is not altogether in accordance with Mr. Dickens' idea but the author of "Caleb Willaams" was too good an artist not to perceive the advantage derivable from at least a somewhat similar process. Nothing is more clear than that every plot, worth the name, must be elaborated to its denouement before anything be attempted with the pen. It is only with the denouement constantly in view that we can give a plot its indispensable air of consequence, or causation, by making the incidents and especially the tone at all points, tend to the development of the intention. There is a radical error, I think, in the usual mode of constructing a story. Either history affords a thesis or one is suggested by an incident of the day or at best, the author sets himself to work in the combination of striking events to form merely
APPENDIX
297
the basis of his narrative designing, generally, to fill in with description, dialogue, or autorial com-
ment, whatever crevices of fact, or action, may from page to page, render themselves apparent. I prefer commencing with the consideration of an Keeping originality always in view for he is effect.
false to himself
ventures to dispense with so obvious and so easily attainable a source of interest I say to myself, in the first place, " Of the innumerable effects, or impressions, of which the heart, intellect or (more generally) the soul is susceptible, what one shall I, on the present occasion choose?" Having chosen a novel, first, and secondly a vivid effect, I consider whether it can be best wrought by incident or tone whether by ordinary incidents and pecuUar tone, or the converse, or by peculiarity both of incident and tone afterward looking about me (or rather within) for such combinations of event, or tone, as shall best aid me in the construction of the
who
effect.
I have often thought how interesting a magazine paper might be written by any author who would that is to say, who could detail step by step, the processes by which any one of his compositions attained its ultimate point of completion. Why such a paper has never been given to the world, I am at a loss to say but, perhaps, the autorial vanity has had more to do with the omission than any one other Most writers poets in especial prefer havcause. ing it understood that they compose by a species of an ecstatic intuition and would posifine frenzy tively shudder at letting the public take a peep behind the scenes, at the elaborate and vacillating cruat the true purposes seized only dities of thought at the last moment at the innumerable glimpses of idea that arrived not at the maturity of full view at the fully matured fancies discarded in despair as un-
298
APPENDIX
at the cautious selections and rejecthe painful erasures and interpolations the tackle for in a word, at the wheels and pinions the step-ladders and demon traps scene-shifting the cock's feathers, the red paint and the black patches, which, in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred, constitute the properties of the literary histrio. I am aware, on the other hand, that the case is
manageable
tions
at
by no means common,
sions
in
condition to retrace the steps
which an author is at all in by which his conclu-
have been attained. In general, suggestions, having arisen pell-mell, are pursued and forgotten in a similar manner. For my own part, I have neither sympathy with the repugnance alluded to, nor, at any time, the least
of
mind the progressive steps compositions; and since the interest of an analysis, or reconstruction, such as I have considered a desideratum, is quite independent of any real or fancied interest in the thing analyzed, it will not be regarded as a breach of decorum on my part to show the modus operandi by which some one of my
difficulty in recalling to
any
of
my
own works was put
together. I select "The Raven" It is my design to as the most generally known. render it manifest that no one point in its composithat tion is referable either to accident or intuition the work proceeded, step by step, to its completion with the precision and rigid consequence of a mathematical problem. Let us dismiss, as irrelevant to the poem, per se, the circumstance or say the necessity which, in the first place, gave rise to the intention of composing a poem that should suit at once the popular and the
critical taste.
We commence,
The
any
initial
then, with this intention. consideration was that of extent. literary work is too long to be read at one
If
sit-
APPENDIX
299
ting, we must be content to dispense with the immensely important effect derivable from unity of impression for, if two sittings be required, the affairs of the world interfere, and everything like totality is at once destroyed. But since, ceteris paribus, no poet can afford to dispense with anything that may idvance his design, it but remains to be seen whether there is, in extent, any advantage to counterbalance the loss of unity which attends it. Here I say no, at oice. What we term a long poem is, in fact, merely a succession of brief ones that is to say, of brief poetical effects. It is needless to demonstrate that a poem is such, only inasmuch as it intensely excites,
by elevating, the soul: and all
intense excitements are, through a psychal necessity, brief. For this reason, at Itast one half of the "Paradise Lost" is essentially proffi a succession of poetical excitements interspened, inevitably, with corresponding depressions the vhole being deprived, through the extremeness of itslength, of the vastly important artistic element,
totaliy, or unity, of effect.

limit, as regards length, to all
It ippears evident, then, that there is a distinct works of literary art
the Unit of a single sitting and that, although in certaii classes of prose composition, such as " Robinson Crasoe" (demanding no unity), this limit may be advmtageously overpassed, it can never properly be ovepassed in a poem. Within this limit, the extent of a poem may be made to bear mathematical relation to its merit in other words, to the excitement.oi elevation again, in other words, to the degree of :he true poetical effect which it is capable of produciig; for it is clear that the brevity must be in direct r;tio of the intensity of the intended effect: that a certain degree of durathis, wi'h one proviso tion is i)solutely requisite for the production of any
effect at all.
300
APPENDIX
Holding in view these considerations, as well as that degree of excitement which I deemed not above the popular, while not below the critical, taste, I reached at once what I conceived the proper length a length of about one hunfor my intended poem
dred
lines.
It
is
in fact a
hundred and
eight.
next thought concerned the choice of an impression, or effect, to be conveyed; and here I might as well observe that, throughout the construction, } kept steadily in view the design of rendering tha work universally appreciable. I should be carried toi) far out of my immediate topic were I to demonstrate a point upon which I have repeatedly insisted, aid which, with the poetical stands not the slightest need the point I mean, that Beaut;" is of demonstration the sole legitimate province of the poem. A :'ew words, however, in elucidation of my real meanng, which some of my friends have evinced a disposi:ion to misrepresent. The pleasure which is at once the most intense, the most elevating, and the most pure, is, I believe, found in the contemplation of the beautiful. When indeed men speak of Beauty, they nean, precisely, not a quality, as is supposed, but ai effect they refer, in short, just to that intense and pure elevation of soul npt of intellect, or of h<art
My
upon which I have commented, and which is experienced in consequence of contemplating " the teautiful." Now I designate Beauty as the provhce of the poem, merely because it is an obvious ruleof Art that effects should be made to spring from direct causes that objects should be attained tlrough means best adapted for their attainment noone as yet having been weak enough to deny that th< pecu-
alluded to is most readily attainecin the the object Truth, or the excitenent of the Heart, are, although attainable, to a certlin degree, in poetry, far more readily attainable in prose.
liar elevation
poem.
Now
APPENDIX
301
Truth, in fact, demands a precision, and Passion, a homeliness (the truly passionate will comprehend me) which are absolutely antagonistic to that Beauty which, I maintain, is the excitement, or pleasurable elevation, of the soul. It by no means follows from anything here said, that passion or even truth, may not be introduced, and even profitably introduced, into a poem for they may serve in elucidation, or aid the general effect, as do discords in music, by contrast but the true artist will always contrive, first, to tone them into proper subservience to the predominant aim, and, secondly, to enveil them as far as possible, in that Beauty which is the atmosphere and the essence of the poem. Regarding, then. Beauty as my province, my next question referred to the tone of its highest manifestation and all experience has shown that this tone is one of sadness. Beauty of whatever kind, in its extreme development invariably excites the sensitive soul to tears. Melancholy is thus the most legitimate of all the poetical tones. At length, the province, and the tone, being thus determined, I betook myself to ordinary induction, with the view of obtaining some artistic piquancy which might serve me as a key-note in the construction of the poem some pivot upon which the whole structure might turn. In carefully thinking over all the usual artistic effects or more properly points, in the theatrical sense I did not fail to perceive immediately that not one had been so universally employed as that of the refrain. The universality of its employment sufficed to assure me of its intrinsic value, and spared me ^he necessity of submitting it to I considered it, however, with regard to analysis.
its susceptibility of
improvement, and soon saw
it
As commonly used, to be in a primitive condition. the refrain, or burden, not only is limited to lyric
302
verse,
APPENDIX
but depends for its impression upon the force both in sound and thought. The pleasure is deduced solely from the sense of identity
of
monotone
I resolved to diversify, and so of repetition. vastly heighten, the effect^ by adhering, in general, to the monotone of sound, while I continually varied that of thought; that is to say, I determined to produce continuously novel effects, by the variation of the refrain itself rethe application of the refrain maining, for the most part, unvaried. These points being settled, I next bethought me of the nature of my refrain. Since its application was to be repeatedly varied, it was clear that the refrain itself must be brief, for there would have been an insurmountable difficulty in frequent variations of apIn proportion plication in any sentence of length. to the brevity of the sentence, would, of course, be the facility of the variation. This led me at once to a single word as the best refrain. The question now arose as to the character of the word. Having made up my mind to a refrain^ the division of the poem into stanzas was, of course, a corollary; the refrain forming the close to each stanza. That such a close, to have force, must be sonorous and susceptible of protracted emphasis, admitted no doubt; and these considerations inevitably led me to the long o as the most sonorous vowel, in connection with r as the most producible consonant. The sound of the refrain being thus determined, it became necessary to select a word embodying this sound, and at the same time in the fullest possible keeping with the melancholy which I had predetermined as the tone of the poem. In such a search it would have been absolutely impossible to overlook the word "Nevermore." In fact, it was the very first which presented itself. The next desideratum was a pretext for the con-
APPENDIX
303
tinuous use of the one word "Nevermore." In observing the difficulty which I at once found in inventing a sufficiently plausible reason for its continuous repetition, I did not fail to perceive that this difficulty arose solely from the pre-assumption that the word was to be so continuously or monotonously spoken by a human being I did not fail to perceive, in short, that the difficulty lay in the reconciliation of this monotony with the exercise of reason on the part of the creature repeating the word. Here then, immediately, arose the idea of a non-resLSoning creature capable of speech; and very naturally, a parrot, in the first instance, suggested itself, but was superseded forthwith by a Raven, as equally capable of speech, and infinitely more in keeping with the in-
tended
I
tone.
had now gone so far as the conception of a Raven the bird of ill omen monotonously repeating the one word "Nevermore" at the conclusion of each stanza, in a poem of melancholy tone, and in length about one hundred lines. Now, never losing
sight of the object, supremeness, or perfection, at all points, I asked myself "Of all melancholy topics, what, according to the universal understanding of
mankind,
Death was is the most melancholy?" "And when," I said, "is this the obvious reply. most melancholy of topics most poetical?" From what I have already explained at some length, the
obvious "When it most closely allies itself to Beauty: the death, then, of a beautiful woman is, unquestionably, the most poetical topic and equally is it beyond doubt that in the world the lips best suited for such topic are those of a bereaved lover." I had now to combine the two ideas, of a lover lamenting his deceased mistress and a Raven conanswer, here also,
is
tinuously repeating the
word "Nevermore."
I had
304
APPENDIX
to combine these, bearing in mind my design of varying at every turn, the application of the word repeated; but the only intelligible mode of such combination is that of imagining the Raven employing the word in answer to the queries of the lover. And here it was that I saw at once the opportunity afforded for the effect on which I had been depending that is to say, the effect of the variation of application. I saw that I could make the first query propounded by the lover the first query to which the Raven should reply "Nevermore" that I could make tliis first query a commonplace one the second less so the third still less, and so on until at length the lover, startled from his original nonchalance by the melancholy character of the word itself by its frequent repetition and by a consideration of the ominous reputation of the fowl that uttered it is at length excited to superstition, and wildly propounds queries of a far different character queries whose solution he has passionately at heart propounds them half in superstition and half in that species of despair which delights in self-torture propounds them not altogether because he believes in the prophetic or demoniac character of the bird (which, reason assures him, is merely repeating a lesson learned by rote) but because he experiences a phrenzied pleasure in so modelling his questions as to receive from the expected "Nevermore" the most delicious because the most intolerable of sorrow. Perceiving the opportunity thus afforded me or more strictly, thus forced upon me in the progress of the construction I first established in mind the climax, or concluding query that to which "Nevermore" should be in the last place an answer that in reply to which this word "Nevermore" should involve the utmost conceivable amount of sorrow and despair.
APPENDIX
305
Here then the poem may be said to have its beginning at the end, where all works of art should begin for it was here, at this point of my preconsiderations, that I first put pen to paper in the composition of the stanza:
" Prophet," said

devil!
I,
" thing of evil
prophet
still, if
bird or
By
that heaven that bends above us by that God we both adore, Tell this soul with sorrow laden, if within the distant Aidenn, It shall clasp a sainted maiden whom the angels name Lenore Clasp a rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore." Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore."
'
I composed this stanza, at this point, first that, by establishing a climax, I might the better vary and graduate, as regards seriousness and importance, the preceding queries of the lover and, secondly, that I might definitely settle the rhythm, the metre, and the
length and general arrangement of the stanza as well as graduate the stanzas which were to precede, so that none of them might surpass this in rhythmical effect. Had I been able, in the subsequent composition, to construct more vigorous stanzas, I should without scruple, have purposely enfeebled them, so as not to interfere with the climacteric
effect.
And here I may as well say a few words of the versification.
The
first object (as usual) was originality. extent to which this has been neglected, in versification, is one of the most unaccountable things in the world. Admitting that there is little possibility of variety in rhythm, it is still clear that the possible varieties of metre and stanza are absolutely infinite
My
3o6
APPENDIX
and yet, for centuries no man, in verse, has ever done, or ever seemed to think of doing, an original thing. The fact is, originality (unless in minds of very unusual
by no means a matter, as some suppose, of impulse or intuition. In general, to be found, it must be elaborately sought, and although a positive merit of the highest class, demands in its attainment less of invention than negation. Of course, I pretend to no originality in either the rhythm or metre of the ** Raven." The former the latter is octameter acatalectic, is trochaic alternating with heptameter catalectic repeated in the refrain of the fifth verse, and terminating with tetrameter catalectic. Less pedantically the feet employed throughout (trochees) consist of a long syllable followed by short; the first line of the stanza the second of seven consists of eight of these feet and a half ( in effect two-thirds) the third of eight the fourth of seven and a half the fifth the same the sixth three and a half. Now each of these lines, taken individually, has been employed before and what originaUty the "Raven" has, is in their combination into stanza; nothing even remotely approaching this combination has ever been attempted. The effect of this originality of combination is aided by other unusual, and some altogether novel effects,
force) is
from an extension of the application of the rhyme and alliteration. The next point to be considered was the mode of bringing together the lover and the Raven and the For first branch of this consideration was the locale. this the most natural suggestion might seem to be a forest, or the fields but it has always appeared to
arising
principles of
me that a close
circumscription of space is absolutely necessary to the effect of insulated incident: it has the force of a frame to a picture. It has an indisputable moral power in keeping concentrated the at-
APPENDIX
tention, and, of course,
307^
must not be confounded with
mere unity
ber
of place.
I determined, then, to place the lover in his chamin a chamber rendered sacred to him by memo-
her who had frequented it. The room is represented as richly furnished this in mere pursuance of the ideas I have already explained on the subject of Beauty, as the sole true poetical thesis. The locale being thus determined, I had now to introduce the bird and the thought of introducing him through the window, was inevitable. The idea of making the lover suppose, in the first instance, that the flapping of the wings against the shutter, is a ''tapping" at the door, originated in a wish to increase, by prolonging, the reader's curiosity, and in a desire to admit the incidental effect arising from the lover's throwing open the door, finding all dark, and thence adopting the half-fancy that it was the spirit of his mistress that knocked. I made the night tempestuous, first, to account for the Raven's seeking admission, and secondly, for the effect of contrast with the (physical) serenity within the chamber. I made the bird alight on the bust of Pallas, also for the effect of contrast between the marble and the plumage it being understood that the bust was absolutely suggested by the bird the bust of Pallas being chosen, first, as most in keeping with the scholarship of the lover, and, secondly, for the sonorousness of the word, Pallas, itself. About the middle of the poem, I have availed myself of the force of contrast, with a view of deepening the ultimate impression. For example, an air of the fantastic approaching as nearly to the ludicrous as was admissible is given to the Raven's entrance. He comes in "with many a flirt and
ries of
flutter."
3o8
Not the
APPENDIX
not a moment stopped least obeisance made he or stayed he, But with mien of lord or lady, perched above my chamber door.
In the two stanzas which follow, the design obviously carried out:
is
more
Then
this ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling By the grave and stern decorum of the countenance it wore, "Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou," I said, "art sure no craven, Ghastly, grim, and ancient Raven wandering from the nightly shore Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night*s Plutonian shore!" Quoth the Raven "Nevermore."
Much I
marvelled
this
ungainly fowl to hear discourse so
plainly.
Though its answer little meaning little relevancy bore; For we cannot help agreeing that no living human being
Ever yet was blessed with seeing bird above his chamber
door
Bird or beast upon the sculptured bust above his chamber

dooff
With such name
as
"Nevermore."
effect of the denouement being thus provided immediately drop the fantastic for a tone of the most profound seriousness: this tone commencing in the stanza directly following the one last quoted, with the line,
for, I
The
But the Raven,

only, etc.
sitting lonely
on that placid bust, spoke
From this epoch the lover no longer jests no longer sees anything even of the fantastic in the
APPENDIX
Raven's demeanor.
309
He speaks of him as a "grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt, and ominous bird of yore," and feels the "fiery eyes" burning into his "bosom's core." This revolution of thought or fancy, on the lover's part, is intended to induce a similar one on the part of the reader to bring the mind into a proper frame for the denouement which is now brought about as rapidly and as directly as possible. With the denouement proper with the Raven's reply, "Nevermore," to the lover's final demand if he shall meet his mistress in another world the poem, in its obvious phase, that of a simple narrative, may be said to have its completion. So far, everything of the real. is within the limits of the accountable raven, having learned by rote the single word "Nevermore," and having escaped from the custody of its owner, is driven at midnight, through the violence of a storm, to seek admission at a window from which a light still gleams the chamber-window of a student, occupied half in poring over a volume, half in dreaming of a beloved mistress deceased. The casement being thrown open at the fluttering of the bird's wings, the bird itself perches on the most convenient seat out of the immediate reach of the student, who, amused by the incident and the oddity of the visitor's demeanor, demands of it in jest and without looking for a reply, its name. The raven addressed, answers with its customary word, "Nevermore" a word which finds immediate echo in the melancholy heart of the student, who, giving utterance aloud to certain thoughts suggested by the occasion, is again startled by the fowl's repetition of "Nevermore." The student now guesses the state of the case, but is impelled as I have before ex-
plained, by the human thirst for self-torture, and in part by superstition, to propound such queries to the bird as will bring him, the lover, the most of the
3IO
APPENDIX
luxury of sorrow, through the anticipated answer "Nevermore." With the indulgence, to the extreme, of this self-torture, the narration, in what I have termed its first or obvious phase, has a natural termination, and so far there has been no overstepping of the limits of the real. But in subjects so handled, however skilfully, or with however vivid an array of incident, there is always a certain hardness or nakedness, which repels the artistical eye. Two things are invariably required first, some amount of complexity, or more properly, adaptation; and, secondly, some amount
of suggestiveness
definite, of
some under-current, however
in-
meaning. It is this latter, in especial, which imparts to a work of art so much of that richness (to borrow from colloquy a forcible term) which we are too fond of confounding with the ideal. It is the excess of the suggested meaning it is the rendering this the upper instead of the undercurrent of the theme which turns into prose (and that of the very flattest kind) the so-called poetry of the so-called
transcendentaHsts. Holding these opinions, I added the two concluding stanzas of the poem their suggestiveness being thus made to pervade all the narrative which has preceded them. The undercurrent of meaning is rendered first apparent in the lines
"Take thy beak from out my

from
off
heart,
and take thy form
my
door!"
Quoth the Raven "Nevermore."

It will be observed that the words, "from out my heart," involved the first metaphorical expression in the poem. They, with the answer, "Nevermore," dispose the mind to seek a moral in all that has been previously narrated. The reader begins now to re-
APPENDIX
311
gard the Raven as emblematical but it is not until the very last line of the very last stanza, that the intention of making him emblematical of Mournful and Never-ending Remembrance is permitted distinctly to be seen:
And
the Raven, never
flitting, still is sitting, still is sit-
ting,
On
the pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber door; And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon's that is
dreaming.
And the lamplight o'er him

on the
floor;
streaming throws his shadow
And my
soul
from
out thai
shadow that
lies floating
on
the floor
Shall be lifted
nevermorel
INDEX
Accident, place
Action, stories Action, unity
of, 83, 91. of, 198.
Centre of interest, 35. Character Drawing: inconsistency in, for story purpose, 87; weak motivation, 89; practice of Turgenieff,
115;
acters,
of.
See Unity.
Alice in Wonderland, 255. Another Gambler, 241.
Art of Fiction, The, 164, 290. As You Like It, 89, 170, 252. Austen, Jane, 33, 252, 258. Autobiography. See Narrative.
conventional
char-
n6;
Hawthorne,
117; selection in character drawing, 118; freedom from

inconsistencies, 118;
simplification,
overchar-
120;
Beta,
Baa, Black Sheep, 50.

184,
acters
ceived,
imaginatively con-
Balzac, 26, 112.

Barrie,
185;
letter to,
Little
from Stevenson, on
Minister, 249. Bazin, Ren6, 165.
analysis by 122; author, 124; characterization by running analysis, 127; actor-narrator's analysis, 129;
action as
building,
means
131;
Bennett, Arnold, 32.
of character revelation, 130;
Bjomson,
243.
character
analysis of
Black Cat, The, 212. Body-Snatcher, The, 212. Bourget, 241. Bride Comes to Yellow Sky,
The, 162.
variety of
in
Markheim, 132; means employed
good
characterization,
138; illustration from Turgenieff, 139; personal ap-
Brieux, 191.
pearance,
tles,
Bunner, 239.
Caryll,
stories, 200;
character 143; character ti-
215; titles of character

place, 216.
Guy Wetmore,
17;
88.
and
Cask
forces,
Amontillado, The: point of view, 22, 23; unity of place, 56; preparaexposition, 81;
of
tion, 85;
Cinderella:-: outline
and
anal-
ysis of incidents, 9; of view, 27.
point
Clarissa Harlowe, 24.
character simpli-
fication, 120.
Clayhanger, 32. Coincidence, 83, 86, 91.
313
314
Collins, Wilkie, 25.
INDEX
introduction,
154; variety o sense impressions, 154; order of recording details, 155;
difficult,
Conrad, Joseph: Youth, point

of view, 22;
Heart of Darkness, 104, 205; departures from time order,

114, 260; personal description, 146; importance of description in stories, 160; description from Youth,
scene
described
of
through
156;
selection,
eyes
156;
characters,
effect of
mood on
156;
test for relevancy in
description,
part of
emotion in description, 158;

fied
171.
Coward, The: exposition

77;
in,
object of description a uniemotional impression,
preparation
of
in, in,
78;
characterization
type
202.
character
127; story,
159; descriptive point of view, 159; importance of description in modern literature,
160;
weakness of
Crane, Stephen, 161, 163.
Stephen Crane, 161; contrast essential, 163; descrip-
impressionistic description
Daudet, 236.
De Foe, 23, 160, De Morgan, 81.

Description:
199.
of
tion not to be considered as

corre-
lack
and
spondence between writing seeing, 143; avoidance

of personal description in
brief personal
stories, 144;
descriptions,
146;
assist-
separate element of story but as fused with action, 164; citation from Henry illustration James, 164; from Bazin's Redemption, 165; from Tlie Egoist, 167; Kipling, 171; Conrad, 171;
ance of reader enlisted, 146; description by slow accumulation of details, 147;

order
lantrae,
Douglas, 172. Detective story, 92, 93.

Dialect, 180, 182, 183.
of
description
in
Dialogue: as a means of exposition,
scene from Master of Balindividual148;

details, 149; elaborateness of personal descrip-
izing
forced for 74; story purpose, 76; must be individual, 175; must ad-
tion dependent
of story,
on length
illustration
149;
from The Singers, 150; undue reliance on vision, 151;

surroundings 152; indicative of personality,
dress,
vance story, 176; must be more clear than speech of reality, must be 177; swifter than colloquial
it
speech, 178; writer makes interpretative, not literal,

178;
literalness of speech,
152;
description of back-
ground,
153;
conciseness
179; departure from normal in story attracts attention.
INDEX
i8o;
all
3^5
of, 75;
variations
i8o;
must be
dialect,
74; various devices
deliberate,
direct exposition, 76; place
i8o; modified dialects, i8i;
in story,
77; preparation,
place of dialect stories, 182;
growth
of literalness in re-
78; inadequate preparation in Guy Mannering, 79; ex-
cording dialect, 183; illusaations from: Scott, 184,

Barrie,
185, Kipling,
position in Cask of Amontillado, 81; integral part of

action, 83 the place of accident, 83; story action pre;
186;
standardized speech, 187; degree of literalness advisable,
dictable,
188;
peculiarities of
86;
84; coincidence, inconsistency of char-
speech not essential to individualization, 189;
"key
of dialogue" discussed, 190;
acter, 87; weak motivation, 89; accident a violation of story logic, 90; adequacy
subject-matter of dialogue, 191; harmony of dialogue with tone of story, 192,196; incongruities of reality,
193; selected diction, 194;
classes of words, 195; neces-
of causation, 90;
when
ac-
cident and coincidence are

permissible, 91; the surprise story, 92; structure of detective story, 92; surprise
sity for
training the ear,

of dialogue
196;
harmony
prepared for, 94; The Lady or the Tiger, 94; problem of introductions due in part
to exposition, 96.
and author's narrative The Ebb Tide, 197.

Diary. See Narrative. Dickens, 34, 222.
Diction, 194.
in
Extravaganza, 254.
Fall of the The, 204.
House of Usher,
Douglas, George, 172. Doyle, Conan, 26. Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, 282. Drums of the Fore and Ajty
The, 186.
Fielding, 33, 38.
Gold Bug, The, 42.
Guy Mannering,
79.
Dumas,
Ebb
246.
Hamlet, 85, 130, 249, 252.

Tide, The, 197, 257. Egoist, The, 167, 222.
Eliot, George, 29, 281.
Hardy, 222.
Harrison, Frederic, 281. Hawthorne: point of view in
Scarlet Letter, 32;
End
of the Tether, The, 114. Exposition by actor-narrator, 65; by author-omniscient, 68; by author-observant, 70; dialogue as a means of,
:
exposi-
tion in Scarlet Letter, 75; oversimplification of character,
117,
120;
title
of
Scarlet
Letter,
220;
con-
3i6
sciously artistic, 261;
of note-books, 287.
INDEX
use
and Aft, 186;
Man Who
action
titles,
Would
story,
Be
King,
Heart of Darkness^ 104, 205. Henry, O., 95, 204, 256.
199; names, 226;
220; suggestion in
Henry Esmond,
235.
They, 23 1 ; devices for suggestion, 240; story of super-
Hermiston, 250. Hilda Lessways, 32. House with the Green Shutters,
The, 172. Howells, 75, 256, 258.
natural,
249;
concealment
of artistry, 259.
Lady
La Grande
Introductions:
or the Tiger, The, 94. Breteche, 112.
complicated
Lear of the Steppes, A, 124,

201, 216.
by
necessity for exposition,
96; characteristic openings, necessity of honest 97;
opening, 97; philosophical opening, 99; Sire de Malitroii's
Leeby and Jamie, 185. Life, departures from, stories. See Selection.
Ligeia, 223,
in
Without Benefit of Clergy, loi; TakDoor, 100;

of the
Literary classifications, analogy of, to gradations of

color, 2.
ing
Redoubt,
102;
Heart
108;
of Darkness, 104; Murders in the Rue Morgue,
Literary power: dependent on freshness of impression and

ing
Thrown Away,
109.
truth of insight, 286; trainof observation, 287;

of
James, Henry: 115, 248; quotations from Art of Fiction,

164, 290.
development
power
of
thought, 288; what a storywriter should read, 289;
sympathy and
Kipling:
insight, 289;
time transitions in Baa, Baa, Black Sheep, 50; exposition in Without Beneof Clergy, 68, 77, 79, 8s; introduction to same, loi;
the nature of experience,

290; limitation of endow-
ment,
292;
example
of
fit
Stevenson, 292. Little Minister, The, 26, 249,

251.
introduction
to
Thrown
Away,
method,
ration in
109;
1
journalistic
10; order of nar-
Man Who Would

112; personal de-
Lodging for the Night, A, 202. Lorna Doone, 22. Love of Romance, The, 7a
Macbeth, 235.
Be King,
scription in, 145; description of setting in Without

Benefit of Clergy, 171;
lect in
dia-
Man Who Was, the, 218. Man Who Would Be King,

The,
Drums
of the Fore
H2,
199.
INDEX
Man
without a Country, The,
of action,
in,
317
and
224;
associations of
223; indicative of race

class,
209, 218.
Markheim: unity
39; 128,
given names, 225; neutral
characterization
names, 226.
Narrative, the essentials of: definition, object of 6; autobiography, 7; diary, 8; story defined, 9; relation of incidents in story,
dialogue to 132; further action, 176; character story, 202;

of style, 230.
economy
The,
Master
of
Ballantrae,
25, 148, 151.
12-15;
comparison
with
Maupassant: time in Necklace, 49; place in Piece of exposition in String, 60;
incidents of biography, 14; positive and negative

forces, 17; relation of story
Coward, 77; characterization in Coward, 127; Coward, a character story, 202; Necklace, a story of idea, 208; Moonlight, a story of
to
life,
19; narrative order,
III.
emotional
theme
of
effect,
212; 220;
Narrative order. See Order. Necklace, The: time covered, 49; purpose of, 208; title of, 220; ending of, 229.
Nesbit, E., 70. Ne Vinson, 261.
Necklace,
ending of Necklace,
philosophical
tions, 240;
229; introduc-
Next Corner, The, 88.

Old Curiosity Shop, The, 34. Ordeal of Richard Feverel,
The, 250, 251.
stories of super-
natural,
249; training in observation, 287.

in selection, 7.
Memory: part played

Meredith, George, 29,
222.
167,
Order of narration: deviation from time order in novels, iii; deviation from time
order in short stories, 112;
M6rim6e, 103,
Merry Men, The : exposition

in, 65, 77;
Man Who Would Be

tification for
King,
character anal-
112; effectiveness sole jus112;
ysis in, 129;

title,
theme
of,
205;
216.
Moonlight, 212. Moonstone, The, 25. Murders in the Rue Morgue,

The, 108.
112;
deviation, La Grande Breteche, End of the Tether, 114.

239.
Othello, s^, 130, 176.
Our Aromatic Uncle,

Philosophy
Names
of characters: openly
designating character, 222; character, of suggestive
of Composition, The, 266; quoted in Appendix, 295.
Piece of String, The, 60.
3i8
INDEX
point
257-
Pilgrim's Progress, 120. Pit and the Pendulum, The,

55-
of
view
to
tone,
Preparation.
See Exposition.
Place,
titles,
names
215.
of,
in
story
Psychology of story writing: necessity for theme, 266;

sources of story ideas, 267; action theme elaborated,
268; 269;
See Unity. Poe: forces in Cask of Amonpoint of view tillado, 17;

Place, unity of.
of
character
themes,
participant
in
action,
22, 23;
unity of action in
Bug, 42; unity of place in Purloined Letter, 54, in Pit and Pendulum, 55; flow of scene in Cask of Amontillado $6; exposition in same, 81, 85; character in same, 120; introduction to Murders in Rue theme in Morgue, 108;
Gold
,
themes derived from place, 270; themes derived from ideas, 270; theme of emotional purpose elaborated, 271;
story growth,
278; conviction and suggestion result of slow
growth, 279; technic a guide to imagination, 280;

citation
letters,
from George Eliot's

281;
Stevenson's
Jekyll and
limitations
Fall of the
204;
House of Usher, method of work in
method in Dr. Mr. Hyde, 282;

of analysis, 283.
Raven, 210; Philosophy of Composition quoted in Apmethod in pendix, 295;

212; Ligeia, 223; consciously artistic, 260,
stories,
Purloined Letter, The, 54.
Realism.
Red Badge
161.
See Selection. of Courage, The,
Point of view: definition

21;
of,
of actor-narrator, 22;
Redemption, 165.
Restraint, 233. Resurrection, 38.
composite
of
narrative,
24;
minor character, 25; a
convention, 26; of author, 27; of omniscient author, 28; of observant author,

28;
Rise of Silas Lapham, The, 75. Robinson Crusoe, 23, 160, 199.
Rodin, 227.
limited
of
omniscience,
author,
Romeo and
Juliet, 85, 252.
31;
^y,
relation to suggestion,
obtrusive
Scarlet Letter, The, 32, 75, 220.
33;
necessity of maintainrelation to centre
Schwob, Marcel, 252.

Scott, 79, 184, 246. Selection: part played
ing, 34;
of interest, 36;
determin-
by
ing initial exposition, 65, 68, 70; descriptive point of
memory,
cident
7;
selection of in-
essential
to
story
view, 159, 174; relation of
structure, 9;
of character
INDEX
traits, 12, 118;
319
in descrip-
tion, 146, 149, 155; effect of mood on selection in de-
unity of action in Markheim, 39; time in Sire de MalHr oil's Door, 48; exposition in
scription,
ities
of
life
incongru156; necessitating
193;
Merry Men,
65,
selection, 193; speech freed
77; comment on preparation in Guy Mannering, 79;
from
irrelevancies,
introduction
acterization
129, in
ter
to
in
Sire
de
part of selection in diction, 194, 196; selection in character stories, 201; suggestion dependent
tion, 228, 242;
Malitroit's Door, 100; char-
Treasure
Island, 116, in
upon
selec-
Merry Men, Markheim, 132; de-
selection in
scription of person in
Mas-
harmony with emotion

creates unity of tone, 245. Shakespeare: tone in plays and nature of preparation, 85, 89, 249, 252; characterization,
of BaUantrae, 148, 151; dialogue to advance action
Markheim, 176; key of dialogue, 190; tone in Ebb Tide, 197, 257; character
in
stories,
130;
dialogue,
of
202;
of
Merry Men,
place,
176, 191;
restraint, 234.
story
205;
effect,
Short
i;
story:
inaccuracy
stories of
emotional
definition based
on length,
uncertainty of definiform,
3;
2;
212; stories of action, 246; discussion of tone of Little
tion based on peculiarity

of
analogy
of
to
ex-
novel,
technic
deter-
mined by analysis
periments in the form, 5; defined chiefly in terms of unity of tone and singleness of impression, 284.
Siege of Berlin, The, 236. Simplification. See Selection.
Minister and Richard Feverel, 249; Schwob on impossible incidents in Stevenson, 252; artfulness not always effective, 260; tone
in Will 0' the Mill, 263; abstract origin of Jekyll and
Hyde, 282; limitations and

inspiration of S., 292.
Singers, The, 150,
Sire de Malitroit's Door, The,

48, 100.
Stockton, 94, 260. Story: definition of, 9; essentials of, see Narrative. Story of the Physician and the
Slum Stories of London, Somehow Good, 81.
261.
Speech. See Dialogue. Stevenson: point of view in Treasure Island, 24, in Master of BaUantrae, 25;
Saratoga Trunk, 126. Suggestion: relation to point of view, 33; defined, 228; artful ending, 229; economy
of exposition, 230; as illus-
trated in
They,
231;
re-
straint as suggestion, 233;
320
enlargemaiit
INDEX
by
suggestion,
place, 2 is;
235; Daudet's Siege of Berlin, 236; incidents antecedent or auxiliary to story,

239; generalized or philosophical introduction, 240; necessity of creating more
names of charand place, 216; literary and allusive titles, 217;

acter
too explicit titles, 218; the concrete title, 219; length

of
title,
221; titles of fairy
tales, 221.
than
is
put in story, 240;
Bourget's Another Gambler, 241; suggestion dependent upon experience of reader, 242; power of realism in
suggestion, 242; difl&culty of appreciating foreign literature, 243; suggestion de-
Tolstoy, 38, 243. Tom Jones, S3, 38.
Tone: determining nature of denouement, 85; necessity dialogue harmonizing of

with, 192;
see Unity.
unity of tone,
Treasure Island, 24, 116.

Turgenieff: point of view of
mands slow
279.
story growth,
minor character, 26; method

of realizing character, 115;
Suicide Club, The, 212, 218. Supernatural, story of, 247,

258.
characterization in A Lear of
the Steppes, 124; in
Tatydna
Surprise story, 92, 254.
Borisovna, 139; personal description in The Singers,
Taking of
102.
the Redoubt,
The,
Tatydna Borisovna and Her Nephew, 139.

Technic: guide to imagination, 280; necessity of, 285;
150; method of work, 201; use of philosophical generalization for suggestion,
Turn
240; universality, 243. of the Screw, The, 249.
Twelfth Night, 252.
inadequacy of inspiration,
285, 293.
Types of story ideas: division on basis of story inception

of action,
Thackeray, 33, 235.
Themes
Types
for
stories.
See
into five groups, 198; stories 198; method of
of story ideas.
They, 220, 231.
Thrown Away,
109.
Time
order.
See Order of
of.
developing action theme, 199; character themes, 200; development of character theme, 201 story of setting,
;
narration.
202;
development
setting,
of story
Time, unity
Titles:
See Unity.
of
from
drawn from name
203; setting in contrast with character
chief character, 214; char-
and action,
of
203, 204; stories
acter
name and
215;
suggested
of setting cited, 204; stories idea,
situation,
names
of
204; Necklace as
INDEX
tjT)e
321
of
idea story,
cited,
208; 209;
ized story of supernatural,
idea
a 10;
stories
stories of
emotional effect, examples of emotion
247; maintenance of established tone, 249; citation
from Stevenson on
Little
stories, 312.
Minister and Richard Fever el, 249; tone in Shakespeare's plays, 252; Schwob on realism of Stevenson,
Unity of action: in character

themes, 38; in stories of
incident, 42;
plicity, 44.
analysis of
252; credibility the test of

action, 254; extravaganza, 254; relation of point of
Gold Bug, 42; a form of sim-
Unity of place: why desirable,

53; transition in Purloined Letter, 54; analysis of Cask
view to tone {Ehh Tide),

256; setting in relation to tone, 257; tone of seeming artlessness, 259; Kipling's
journalistic tone, 260; con-
of Amontillado , 56; likeness of flow of scene to that of
time, 56; effect on reader of transitions in time and

place, 58; lack of specific setting, 60; repetition of
scious artistry of
Poe and
Stevenson, natural 260; tone of Nevinson's Slum Stories of London, 261; tone
in
of analysis 60; Piece of String, 60. Unity of time: desirability of,

scenes,
Wm
0' the
Mill, 263.
Vanity Fair, 235.
45; foreshortening, 46; limitation imposed by experience, 47; analysis of Necklace, 49; of Baa, Baa, Black
Wandering Willie^s
Tale, 184.
Sheep, so; Othello, 52.
Unity of tone: determining nature of story's denouement, 85; necessity of dialogue harmonizing with,
tional
Will 0' the Mill, 263. Without Benefit of Clergy: exposition and preparation in, 68, 77, 79, 85; introduction to, loi; description of
place
in,
171; title of, 220;
names
of characters, 226.
192; definition, 244; emointent in harmony
Yonge, Charlotte M., 98.

Youth, 22, 171.
with theme, 245; rational-
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THE ART OF THE SHORT STORY

THE ART OF THE SHORT STORY

Instructor in English, the University of CbicafO

CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS

CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS

here are for the most part true of

the novel as well as of the short story, though for

and the amateur writer

cannot easily find

For other than commonplace and accepted

Stevenson, whose letters and essays are

with comments of technical interest to writers.

work, a "small and arid book" upon the art of

acknowledged in the following

Poe's The Philosophy of Composition.

he traces the development

The Raven, making

clear the steps of the creative process.

tunately he did not perform a like office for his

even more valuable.

upon the psychology

very thing which the beginner most

esses too mysterious

work by mental procand profound for his under-

should rely upon them alone to

mental processes of story writing.

I have, therefore, in addition to quot-

ing from Stevenson, Poe, and

are seeking to learn the difficult art of

working effectively at story composition.

greatly indebted to the following

bers of the English department of the University

Chicago for helpful criticism and advice: Mrs.

Flint, Mr. Robert M. Lovett, and Mr. James W. Linn.

The Short Story The Essentials of Narrative The Point of View

Action, Time, and

Exposition and Preparation

The Order of Nar96

Suggestion and Restraint

The Psychology of Story Writing

THE ART OF THE SHORT STORY

THE ART OF THE SHORT STORY

THE SHORT STORY

the short story as a distinct form of narrative,

proved suffiwin universal acceptance. failure will be worth noting

at the outset of our discussion of short-story

It is impossible, in the first instance, to state

difficulty in classing the

Odyssey as a long story,

Vanity Fair as a novel.

son with these, the tales of the Arabian Nights

THE SHORT STORY

thcusand woriis, for what, in that

say of a story of sixteen thousand words?

be called by another name, a "novelette,"

To draw so hard and fast a Nor is the difficulty

define a "short story" as one

be two hours or four.

a relative, not a fixed,

tion of the "short story."

encounter equal difficulty

the distinction clear.